


where there’s a hunger within (these wounded hearts can mend)

by moreraventhanothers



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: A Passable Amount of Fluff, Adam Parrish Loves Ronan Lynch, Angst and Fluff, Angst with a Happy Ending, Banter and Heartfelt Gestures, Canon Divergent, Established Relationship, It's Cute How You Think I Could Write Anything Else, Long-Distance Relationship, M/M, More Angst Than I Bet You Were Expecting from This Prompt, Much Stubbornness, Non-Linear Narrative, Pining, Post-The Raven King, Ronan Lynch is Bad at Feelings, Ronan is a Menace, Some Sex, The Ronan Lynch Brand™, The Thirst is Definitely Real, They Communicate Better Than This OKAY?
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-23
Updated: 2018-07-22
Packaged: 2019-03-07 22:37:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 27,655
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13444866
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/moreraventhanothers/pseuds/moreraventhanothers
Summary: It’s the distance, he suspects, that will ruin them in the end.  He doesn’t know if he means the miles, or Ronan’s, or his own.  But he’s incontrovertibly sure it will be that.In which Cabeswater is gone, Ronan’s too far to reach, and Adam’s just trying to hold on.





	1. after

**Author's Note:**

> _Don’t do this_ , I told myself, _they’re supposed to be happy_. Turns out I couldn’t let this one go. Canon-divergence tagged for some general poor communication related unhappiness I don’t believe in.
> 
> Anyway, this mess is a (quasi) prompt fill inspired by an ask and a song. Because I couldn’t control myself and post this as a one-shot, the ask and gift recipient will be revealed upon completion of the story.
> 
> As demonstrated, I have Zero Chill™ — so there’s [also a whole playlist for this fic!](http://moreraventhanothers.tumblr.com/post/170023659793/its-the-distance-he-suspects-that-will-ruin) Some spoilers, maybe, if you have magical plot-guessing powers.
> 
> Errrr, y’all should probably know I can’t write anything without angst. Enjoy?   
>   
> 

_Can you see me_  
_I can barely see myself_  
_Are we only empty frames upon the shelf_  

 

He’s in over his head, he realizes.  The truth creeps in as the shock wears off, insidious and cold.  Adam doesn’t know how to handle _Ronan_ , much less this fledgling thing between them.  How stupid was he, to think he ever stood a chance?

Fear worries at the tangled mess of his thoughts.  Not _of him_ —never that.  Ronan might not look like safety, but he’s always felt that way to Adam.  Even when they’d lived at each other’s throats, something in him just _knew_.  The same thing that’s afraid for Ronan now. 

Because he’s never seen him this broken, so vacant and insensible with grief.  Gansey might have faced it before, but he’s busy leveraging the weight of his own emotional fallout.  He can’t expect…  No.  Adam is on his own here.  

And if he’s praying to a god he’s never believed in, it’s because he needs this time to be different.  Different than with Niall—when Ronan fractured into _before_ and _after_ and almost decided he didn’t want the after.   

Praying he won’t make things worse, somehow.  In the wake of everything that’s happened, Adam doesn’t like what it says about himself that he considers it a possibility.

Losing Aurora.  The failed hunt for Glendower.  The bruises collaring Ronan’s neck; the stains of black seeping from his ears and nose.  The cataclysmic image of Gansey, dead on the ground.  The cutting void of Cabeswater’s absence.  And that pang of murky grief inside him, whispering that they’re missing something else, too.

What was he, in the face of all that loss? 

They gather at Fox Way, after.  All of them:  the Orphan Girl, drawn against herself and sleeping on the couch.  Henry, mercifully subdued and perched on the kitchen counter.  Blue and Gansey, seated with Maura and Calla at the table—trying, in solemn tones, to make sense of what happened.  

A day.  They’d lost a whole _day_.  Was it any wonder the others had been sick with worry?  They’d disappeared into the night and not returned until the hours bled over.  And not one of them had come back unchanged.

Adam is glad, for once, that the only people looking out for him are right here in this room—unlike Gansey, who’d had to beg Helen into running damage control with his parents.  He can’t imagine how that conversation went.  _Apologies for my absence, I was rather occupied dealing with the unforeseen obstacle of my second death?_   The truth was insane.

Thankfully, he had far fewer excuses to make.  He’d already asked off last night’s shift at the factory to attend the fundraiser.  The only thing left to do was apologize to Boyd for missing today, and hope it didn’t cost him his job.  If he’s lucky, the missed Saturday shift, him pleading illness, and the hollowed-out defeat in his voice might add up to something like forgiveness. 

He’s down three days’ wages regardless, but he can’t think about that right now.  Not when his soul’s still trying to piece itself back together. 

He glances at Blue.  At her eye, freshly restitched.  It’s going to scar this time, a permanent reminder of this day.  As if the chilling memory of Gansey dropping dead from her arms wasn’t punishment enough.  Adam wonders if he’ll scar, too.  He thinks he might deserve it.  He thinks he already knows the answer. 

The loss of Cabeswater is a wound too deep to explore.  Like someone’s torn open his every vein, lined his blood with fiberglass, and the phantom ache of the magic that’d become an integral part of him—just… _gone_. 

But Gansey is here; he cannot and will not forget that.  That alone made it all worth it, in the end.

His gaze returns to Ronan, where he leans against the door frame like he can’t wait to leave.  To the mottled skin around his throat.  Adam’s gut clenches; for a moment, he’s sure he might vomit out his heart.  His eyes are devoid of any emotion at all, just vacant pools of hollow gloom.  Adam can’t shake the memory of them clouded over with black.

He moves closer, wanting…  Just, _wanting_.  Ronan’s eyes meet his, dim under dark lashes.  Still so empty.  A trace of something finally flares to life there when Adam reaches a hand toward him.  Then he makes the mistake of looking down, and—

Everything is his hands and Ronan’s neck.  Squeezing, _feeling_ the life fading beneath the press of his fingers and palms and Ronan _not doing anything about it_ and Adam screaming, screaming inside his head _don’t let me do this please not him anything but this please make it stop_.  Adam flinches away.  The light dies. 

Ronan pulls back, radiating a wounded sense of resignation.  _Shit_ , he thinks, but doesn’t understand the weight of what’s happening until he’s already slipped out the door.  “Ronan,” he says belatedly, trailing after him in a fog.  He can’t pry an answer from the jammed gears of his thoughts.  Adam still doesn’t feel real, none of this feels _real_ —

He has an armful of Orphan Girl and a foot out the front door by the time Adam finds him.  “Ronan.”  He won’t even pause.  “Lynch, wait.”  He doesn’t.  _Fix this_ , the chill in his pulse warns.  

Adam follows him out to the BMW, where he’s carefully tucking the girl into the backseat.  Ronan still hasn’t looked at him.  “Ronan?” he tries again.  But he’s all coarse motion and cold shoulder.  _Fix this, Adam_.  A sick sense of helplessness eats its way through his esophagus, through the hands burning uselessly at his sides.  

Ronan slumps into the driver’s seat, not once acknowledging him.  “Where are you even going?” Adam shouts, finally.  He’s out of breath, and can’t understand why. 

The window slides down, exposing Ronan’s profile in the dull glow of the streetlight.  His stare locked forward, knuckles white against the steering wheel.  “Washington,” he grits out over the sound of the engine roaring to life.  Adam grips the edge of the door.  That much, he can manage.

“Right now?”  He can’t hide the incredulity in his voice.  “Like this?  Can’t you stay tonight?  Go in the morning when you’ve got your head on straight?  You haven’t slept at all since—”  The leather sighs a protest under Ronan’s clenched fist.  “With everything that’s happened, do you really think you’re safe to drive?”

His lips curl into a cruel sneer.  “Right now.  _Like this_.”

“Lynch, come on.” 

Ronan finally looks his way.  His eyes are a wasteland.  Adam’s stomach puddles at his feet.  “I need to go check on Matthew.  I have to tell them that Mom—  I have to tell them.” 

“Just wait until tomorrow.  Please.” 

“I have to go.”  He says, voice all gravel and glass. 

“Then I’ll go with you.”  Adam can’t go with him; logically he knows that.  He has school tomorrow, and work after that.  Rinse and repeat.  But he can’t stand the thought of Ronan driving alone, sleepless and tortured by grief—not even in the same neighborhood as _safe_.  Ronan, left to his sorrow.  The thought of him leaving when Adam has hurt him, on top of everything else… 

 _What if he doesn’t come back?_  

Adam doesn’t think it’s a particularly rational thought.  But what, about the last several days, had been?

“No,” Ronan responds curtly.  Matter-of-fact. 

“Let me come with you,” Adam tries again, with a hint of desperation he should probably be ashamed of.

“ _No_ ,” he snarls.  And the window is raising.  Adam snatches his hands back.  The car moves away.  And Ronan is gone.

Something grim washes over him, eroding his insides to dust.  Adam’s head drops back, eyes fixing on the streetlight above until he loses focus.  The sting of salt creeping in at the edges...  That feels right, somehow.  

The world falls to nothing around him.  He doesn’t know how long he stands there.  Time loses its meaning when he feels this adrift.  This cast off. 

“Lost your prince, pup?” Gwenllian croons in the dark.  Taking his silence as an invitation to continue, she hisses, “Mongrels would do best not to run with ravens.” 

And Adam can’t stand _any_ of it.  His hands ball into fists; the bruises throb.  He understands why Ronan channels his emotions into venom and rage.  The anger is easier to feel. 

Adam feels like he could drive his fist through a wall, a tree, a person.  He thinks of the demon, an involuntary flash of it smashing his knuckles into that pine.  The hot burst of pain, Ronan’s audible dismay.  The memory rolls the urge away, into something even more toxic—heavy and steeped in futility.

“Gwenllian!”  Gansey’s tone is positively glacial.  “That’s quite enough.  Such discourtesy is altogether uncalled for, especially now.  You will treat Adam with respect.  End of discussion.”

Gwenllian turns on him, smile predatory and full of teeth.  Her impressive stature dips into an insolent approximation of a curtsey.  “As is your plea, knight of three,” she mocks before melting back into the shadows.

Gansey approaches.  Resting a hand on his shoulder, he lets out a sigh Adam suspects is on his behalf.  He wonders how long, exactly, he’s been outside.  How much he heard.  Tries to decide how he feels about it.  Whether embarrassment should be on the table.  

But Gansey knows.  He knows, and he told Adam not to break Ronan.  And Ronan, tonight _was_ Ronan, broken.  And Adam had still somehow managed to kick him while he was down.  And now he’s gone and— 

“He’ll be back,” Gansey murmurs.  “He doesn’t… handle grief well.”

That’s what Adam is afraid of. 

In the end, he returns to the Barns.  Gansey takes him to collect his car, long since abandoned in the chaotic aftermath of Aurora’s death.  Of Laumonier’s.  Adam finds it in him to be thankful for the Gray Man’s resourcefulness, contentious as his presence at the periphery of Ronan’s life may be.  The living room will show no evidence of that violence when Ronan returns.  A small reparation, but one worthwhile. 

With an offhanded fist-bump, Gansey leaves Adam standing beside the Hondayota.  Staring at the front door of the Lynch home.  Wondering if it’s still unlocked.  He wonders enough to try, to find it open, to creep inside. 

Adam very badly does not want to spend the night alone.  Failing that, he’ll take sleeping in a bed surrounded by the scent of Ronan.  It’s impractical, he knows.  He’ll need to get up half an hour earlier, just to drive back to St. Agnes in the morning.  But the ache inside him doesn’t want to listen to reason.  It just wants Ronan. 

His thoughts won’t grant him any peace.  Glimpses of the day’s worst tragedies burn through instead.  Of Gansey.  Of Cabeswater.  Of the demon, using Adam to hurt Ronan.  Of the deadness in his eyes.  The way he surrendered to defeat the moment he saw Adam flinch away from him.  

Had it really been just three days before, when Ronan had carefully laid his heart bare?  _Right here on this bed_.  That unbridled happiness feels almost too far away to reach, like it belonged to another Adam.  Another Ronan.  Another life.  The tears well up on their own this time. 

It’s not fair, he thinks, that they were broken before they even got a chance to start.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Look, I promise the tags are accurate, okay?


	2. echo

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> cw: grisly nightmare aftermath   
> 
> 
>   
> 

_It's like we're dreaming wide awake_  
_Everything bends until it breaks_  

 

Adam wakes to warmth and misgiving.  It’s late, he knows, but he can’t process the vague underpinning of alarm crackling through him.  His shift isn’t until that afternoon.  He’s done with school, secure in his plans to attend the college of his dreams on a damn near full ride in the fall. 

The future doesn’t hold the same weight over him it used to.  Back when visceral ambition demanded he wear himself down to nothing; when stress and exhaustion were more intimate company than his own face in the mirror.  He’s _free_.

And he’s slept like a rock for most of the summer, the best he ever has.  Not that last-ditch, body pushed through the limits of burnout surrender, either.  The proper kind of rest.  In a proper bed.  With Ronan, a solid weight in his arms.  Their legs tangled up in the duvet and each other.  He’s _happy_.

_Why the hell is he awake?_

A groan parts the soft silence.  It’s the rumbling feel of it under Adam’s palm that snares his thoughts, turning his memory over.  Another low grumble—that’s what dragged him awake. 

He spreads his fingers over Ronan’s chest.  Nudges his face into his back. 

It’s no secret that insomnia and Ronan are old bedfellows.  Sleep might make a better showing next to Adam, but it’s never guaranteed.  Still… this is utterly unlike him.  On the short list of things Ronan finds morally reprehensible, _interfering with Adam’s sleep_ is wedged somewhere between _lying_ and _traffic laws_.  It must be hitting him hard tonight, he thinks.  

The lack of bed abandonment means he’s battling the frustration, though.  Forcing himself still, so as not to wake Adam.  _Gotta try harder than that, Lynch_.  Adam catches a hint of inked skin between his teeth.  

Ronan rocks against him.  And it doesn’t feel like he’s being cheeky.  It’s an abrupt movement.  A muted spasm.  Muscles contracting out of rhythm, jarring his frame just enough to notice. 

Adam can’t help but think of that stray dog from the trailer park.  How it would lay out in the sun, legs quivering with dreams.  Ronan’s still asleep.  Half-in, half-out. 

His breath snags.  And worry skitters over Adam’s skin, raising hair as it goes. 

Another noise.  A stronger tremor.  

It has to be a nightmare; a bad one at that.  Discernible evidence of dreaming is so rare with Ronan.  Adam can usually only ever tell at the end—watching something grow from nothing in their bed, his mind bending over the moment in between.  Or when Ronan jolts awake like his very life depends on it. 

_Sometimes it has_ , he thinks, which doesn’t help at all.

He untangles his hand from Ronan’s, reaching back to grasp his arm at the shoulder.  “Lynch,” he murmurs, accent thickened by sleep. 

Ronan just breathes another sound of distress.  And if Adam hadn’t been awake before, he damn well is now.  Worry drains the air from the room; fills it with urgency.  He has to put a stop to whatever has him sounding so broken.  Not to mention the practicalities of waking Ronan before he can bring back something dangerous. 

Or _any_ unpleasant surprises, really—dangerous or not.  Adam doesn’t feel up to another night spent trying to scrub blood from the mattress.  One inimitable horror show was enough for a lifetime, and thankfully it hadn’t reared its ugly head since…  Not since right after, when things were so bad.

 

✧  ✧  ✧

 

Ronan’s in no hurry to come back; his actions make that perfectly clear.  And God, Adam can’t begrudge him that.  He knows he needs that time in D.C. to spend with what’s left of his family.  To grieve.  To _be_.  But it doesn’t make it any easier to bear.

By the time he drags himself home, Adam’s been wanting for days.  Longing for something to fix the inchoate void rooted in his ribcage.  The knowledge that he’d been something like whole, once.  The devastating certainty that he’s not anymore.  

If he could just see Ronan again; hear his voice, then maybe—  Maybe he could draw the poison from _that_ festering wound, at least.  Instead Adam keeps lurching from nightmares, hands primed to strangle the life from him the minute his eyes slip closed.

Without Ronan there…  _Shit_ , it was so much worse.  Like Adam might have succeeded and just blocked it out.  Like the nightmares were memories, stolen from the deep recesses of forgotten time.

He can’t ignore it.  Not with the gaping, Cabeswater-shaped hole he’s juggling.  He’s been torn to shreds, and the drab monotony of _work-school-work-work-school_ is far from distraction enough.  The others are walking on eggshells.  Around him?  Around Gansey?  He can’t tell.  But without Ronan’s presence to restore some normalcy, some peace—

Adam is not in a good place.  Emotionally.  Mentally.  Physically. 

So really, Ronan’s first words to him shouldn’t come as a surprise. 

“You look like shit, Parrish.”  Half a smile creeps across Adam’s face, the first time since everything went bad.

But things don’t just get better.  Nothing comes easy.  There’s no reset button to get them back to what they were.  It’s one step forward and six steps back.

Ronan isn’t himself.  And it’s not like Adam thought he _would_ be.  Not after losing his mother, his best friend, his dream forest, and very nearly his own damn life—all in the course of what’d felt like a single day. 

No, he definitely didn’t expect the Ronan from last Friday.  But he didn’t know what _to_ expect.  What he got was this:  Ronan, distant.  Ronan, oscillating between a worrisome state of vacancy and maddening impossibility with an alarming lack of preamble. 

He tries not to take it personally.  To ride out the worst of his moods the best that he can.  It’s so obvious he’s looking to push him away, and Adam’s determined not to let him.  But he wonders, with shameful frequency, whether it’s doing him any good to bother.

Because Ronan’s remove is a force in and of itself.  Gone are the careful advances, any evidence of wanting more.  Now it’s like he doesn’t even consider it an option.  _Is it because of me?_ Something inside Adam aches.  He sees the hope fading from Ronan’s eyes.  The memory loops and loops—the risk of a repeat trapping his hands at his sides. 

Of all the arguments waiting to explode between them, that’s one fire he doesn’t want to fuel.  How he can scarcely stand to witness the still-fading bruises around his throat.  How Ronan knows it.  How he maybe thinks it’s _him_ Adam can’t bear to look at.

He wants to tell him he’s wrong.  That it’s nothing he did.  That that’s all on Adam.  (He knows, logically, he wasn’t the one to hurt Ronan.  But it was _his_ body that got used against him, so it’s _his_ instincts misfiring after the fact.)  That he’s sorry he flinched away.  That he wants to hold him so badly, he can hardly take it.  And yet…

And yet.  Irrational fear still lurks in his darkest corners.  That if Adam touches him again, his hands will find a way to betray him.  He _knows_ better.  That the demon’s gone, and Cabeswater right along with it.  His hands belong to him and him alone.  But what is reason in the face of Ronan, dying beneath his grip? 

It’s a brutal stalemate.  At his worst, he wishes Ronan had never kissed him.  That he’d never given Adam that taste of what could have been, if he had no intentions of seeing it through.  It’s idiotic.  He knows Ronan better than that.  But it’s hard to remember through the sharp sneers and spiteful mask of indifference. 

With no shift looming that night, Adam’s free to follow him home from Monmouth.  He doesn’t expect much, and that’s exactly what he gets.  The bulk of their time together is spent just eyeing each other across the kitchen.  Quietly picking at the takeout Ronan stopped for when he realized Adam was serious about coming over.  Apprehension staging a stark barrier between them. 

“Where’s Orphan Girl?” he asks, voice low.  The silence feels almost too thick to break. 

Ronan grunts.  He thinks, for a long moment, it’s all the answer he’s going to get.  “Stayed with Declan and Matthew.  Didn’t want to be here.  Guess all that shit fucked her up pretty bad.  She thinks it’s still dangerous.”  He scowls.  “They get along.  It’s fine.  Whatever.  She’ll come back eventually.  Or she won’t.  Fuck if I give two shits.” 

It’s as close to a lie as he can stand to tell.  Adam can read between the lines of his aggressive disinterest:  he won’t make her come back; not if it’s against her will.  He nods, and watches him stab at his food.

The tension never does thaw.  Ronan’s a ghost in his own home.  Afraid, it seems, to prompt memories of that Saturday by virtue of mere association.  He avoids the living room like a plague.  Stalks upstairs when the well of over-hesitant interaction runs dry.

Glancing over his shoulder, Adam hedges his bets and retires to Declan’s room.  Ronan looks not to give a damn either way.  It bruises his heart.  

He wishes so badly, so greedily, for a sign.  He’d take anything.  The barest hint that they’ll be okay.  He’s not stupid—he knows nothing’s going to happen while Ronan’s so wrecked and raw.  He needs time to grieve, to recover.  Not dissect whatever Adam is to him. 

And he can wait; he will.  He’s good at waiting, a skill honed through long necessity.  But that doesn’t mean he doesn’t want to _know_.  If Ronan’s still in this.  Whether he ever plans on kissing him again.  Whether he even wants him here, now. 

He’s not selfish enough to ask.  He just closes his eyes, and steps inside.

But his mind’s running out from under him.  Adam tosses and turns; staring at the ceiling for minutes that doubtless turn to hours.  He can’t sleep.  If he does, there’s every chance he’ll wind up in another nightmare.  They’ve been nothing if not predictable. 

Ronan’s right down the hall.  But he doesn’t know if...  _God_ , this is stupid.  What’s he gonna do, make fun of him?  Yell?  How many times has _he_ dropped by Adam’s apartment unannounced?  

He’s not asking for much—just to sleep inside the same four walls.  _It shouldn’t be this hard_.  Yet it takes the better part of an hour to pick himself up, take a deep breath, and rap his knuckles against the door.  

A gruff acknowledgment greets him.  Sleep hasn’t come for Ronan either, apparently.  Adam approaches the bed slowly, working to untangle the words knotted in his throat. 

Ronan beats him to the punch.  “What do you want, Parrish?”  There’s no venom in it, just exhaustion.  Not a challenge, but a question.  _What do you want, Adam?_

“Can I…” he swallows.  “Do you care if I stay with you tonight?”  Ronan’s blank stare fixes on Adam long enough for his face to heat.

“I look like shit, I know.  You were right.  I’ve hardly slept, between the nightmares and…”  _Just tell him the truth_.  “Cabeswater.”  _Nothing feels right anymore_.  “And I never got a chance to make sure you were okay, before.  You just _left_ like an asshole, when we were all so damn worried about you.  I– I think…” 

He looks away.  The thing he would most prefer to not bring up—how many times he’s killed Ronan—is the very thing his explanation feels flimsy without.  _What do you want, Adam?_ “I might sleep better if—”

Ronan shoves over before he can finish.  He drags the covers back, as clear an invitation as Adam’s going to get.  He’s quick to take it. 

They fall into sleep on opposite sides of the bed—Ronan on his back, Adam on his side.  Not touching, not speaking.  Miles between them. 

Minutes or hours pass.  Adam can’t for the life of him remember bedding down beside a mud slick, though it’s hard to ignore the evidence seeping toward him.  Except…  No.  The sludge is warm.  And that fetid odor isn’t dirt.

His stomach’s rushing for his throat.  No one ever talks about how bad it smells.  He thinks, half-hysterically, that Ronan’s managed to give new meaning to the word _bloodbath_. 

The most sensible thought in his head is simply:  _fuck_.

He lunges for Ronan, willfully ignoring the slippery muck his palms and knees land in.  There’s so much of it.  So much blood, everywhere.  He can’t even begin to guess whether any of it belongs inside Ronan, and the possibility chills him to the bone.  “ _Shitshitshit_.  Ronan,” he hisses.  Hands hovering uselessly, unsure.  “Come on, Ronan.  _Please_.  Wake up!”

His eyes take too long to open.  At the first hint of blue, Adam demands, “Are you okay?”  Ronan doesn’t answer, blinking slowly but breathing too fast.  “Are you hurt?  Is any of this yours?  _Say something_ , Ronan!”

Terror overcomes him without warning.  Panic and an agonized kind of dread twist through his expression.  Ronan looks as if he’s done the worst thing imaginable, and the evidence of it is staring him right in the face.  “Adam,” he gasps like someone’s dying. 

Adam glances down then, seeing the mess he’s smeared over himself in his rush to reach him.  What Ronan must think, in the context of his awful nightmare.  “Hey, no.  No.  No no no.  Listen to me.  It’s not mine, Ronan.  It’s not mine.  Just… calm down and _answer me_ , will you?  Is any of it _yours_?  Are you hurt?” 

“Oh God.  Oh fuck.”  His voice is ruined.  He nearly crashes to the ground, tripping from the bed in his haste to get away from Adam. 

“Stop!” he cries.  Ronan’s eyes are feral—cornered and terrified.  The dread pooling at the base of his heart tells Adam he’s about to bolt.

“Stop.  You’re wrecking your floor.  Just…”  Maybe logic can drag him back to his senses.  “Go get in the shower, okay?  I’ll get the gloves and trash bags.  We can clean this up.  You’re not hurt, right?  You’re okay.  That’s all that matters.” 

The wide-eyed fear breaks into a contemptuous snarl faster than Adam can blink.  “Just _go_ ,” Ronan growls.  It sounds as if he’s been shouting.  Maybe he has been.

“No.”  _What the hell is he thinking?_

“Get out.” 

Adam stares, incredulous.  He’s impossible.  Does Ronan really think he would leave him like this?  He would never.  

Except—that’s not exactly true, is it?  He _has_.  

That night in the church.  Faced with a dying Ronan and the startling realization that his feelings ran deeper than he’d ever imagined…  It was too much of a shock, on top of everything else.  He couldn’t scrounge up the patience to weather one of Ronan’s useless tantrums.  So Adam let it happen. Let him piss him off.  Abandoned Ronan to deal with the grisly remains of his corpse alone.

He hadn’t had the bandwidth to consider the implications.  He’d _wanted_ to apologize—what passed between them for one, anyway.  But then his father had shown up, and Cabeswater dragged him under to protect him from the shock.  Then came roof tiles and court dates and… 

Adam just never let himself think about it.  What that must have done to Ronan.  Ronan, who’d once tried to kill himself by proxy.  _God._

“ _No._ ”

“Parrish,” he says.  And there’s so much more danger in that level, calculated tone.  “Get the fuck out of my house.”  His voice is hard, hateful, horrible.  Every ounce of all the good in him stripped away.

Hurt blossoms sharp in Adam’s chest.  His first instinct is still to tell Ronan to go fuck himself.  To give him exactly what he’s asking for, and walk out on him.  Leave him to sort out his own damn mess.  Three months ago, he _would_ have.  Likely never to step foot in this place again on principle.  Now, he’s quelled his pride enough to see that future unfolding before him. 

Leaving Ronan to negotiate the gruesome aftermath on his own—while he’s clearly mourning and terrified.  Ronan, covered in blood and left to a house that tonight has only bad memories to give.  It’ll tear a rift between the two of them that neither, stubborn as they are, might repair. 

Adam hadn’t fostered his feelings for months to let things end like _this_.  There was every chance this was just Ronan, shouting where someone could hear him. 

He takes a calculated risk.  “No.  Look me in the eyes and tell me you want me to leave, Ronan.  Tell me that’s what you want, and I’ll go.” 

Ronan just stares, eyes wild and wide and full of something terrible.  Exactly what he thought.

He storms out of the room, a flurry of grudging acceptance.  Adam hears a door slam.  The rush of water running down the hall.  He looses the breath he’s been holding with a muttered _shit_ , and throws himself into action.

As much as it pains his monetary sensibilities, he tosses the bedspread.  The sheets.  The pillows.  Ronan can afford to replace them, and Adam’s running on frantic desperation.  _Finish this, before he comes back_.  He doesn’t want him to have to see any of it again. 

The mattress is salvageable, thankfully.  But it’s half-soaked by the time he cleans up what did seep through the cover.  Ronan slinks back into the room just as he’s finishing the floorboards.  Wearing only a towel.  Mere feet from where Adam is kneeling. 

Longing rushes in, shame hot on its heels.  He tries not to flush as he looks up.  It’s infinitely inappropriate to be lusting after him right now. 

Then Adam notices his eyes, glassy and limned in red.  That sobers him quickly enough.  “You’re gonna have to move to Declan’s room for tonight.  This needs to dry.”  Maybe, if he says the words evenly enough, he can convince him to stay.  “I just need to take this last bag out and wash off, all right?” 

Ronan nods, but doesn’t speak.  Standing stock-still.

Adam hesitates, grappling with whether to voice his logical concern.  But he can’t ignore the possibility of this becoming an even bigger catastrophe, and Ronan’s too shaken to take responsibility.  He has to know.  “Who takes care of the trash up here?  Are they going to…  It’s gonna smell like we tossed a body.” 

“It’ll be gone in the morning,” he mutters.  Which doesn’t make any sense, until Adam remembers how many things in this house _don’t_.  How practical it was, for someone involved in a black market magical artifact trade to fashion himself a self-cannibalizing disposal system.  He’s vaguely impressed by Niall’s ingenuity. 

He exhales.  “Good.”

Fifteen minutes later, he’s tucking himself in next to Ronan.  Ronan, who’s lying motionless under the covers, headphones wrapped around his ears.  The only sound in the room, the faint throb of remnant bass.  The only movement, the gentle rise and fall of his chest. 

As horrible as this all is, at least one mystery’s been solved:  Ronan can still dream.  Which makes perfect sense, really.  He dreamed Cabeswater to life.  Why should _his_ power be tied up in its existence?  Adam only wishes they’d learned some other way.

Declan’s bed is smaller than Ronan’s, an unnecessary complication if there ever was one.  Their sides press together from shoulder to fingertip.  He shivers, panic and dread making a cold home of his spine.  _You can do this.  Don’t be an asshole_.  

He turns from Ronan, pressing his good ear against the pillow.  It fuzzes his perception, morphing the dark room into an indistinct blur of hazy non-sensation.  He doesn’t feel real, this way.  The only thing he feels is vulnerable.  Without Cabeswater there to whisper comfort, he _hates_ it. 

But it leaves a precious few inches of space between them.  Space to protect Ronan.  And that’s reason enough.  Adam falls asleep to the weight of his own painstakingly measured breaths. 

They’re twisted around one another when he wakes.  Ronan’s head tucked into his chest; an arm draped across his back.  Fingers tangled to one side.  Legs hooked together.  

He can feel his pulse in his ears.  Fear digging through his veins.  This is what he was trying so hard to avoid.  Stupid, dangerous contact.  Reckless as flinging lit matches into a sea of gasoline.  Adam could have hurt him.  Could have _killed_ him and never known the difference until morning and—

And he’s okay.  _They’re_ okay.  Adam hasn’t hurt him.  Ronan’s safe, sound in his arms.  He’s in control.  _He’s in control._

And there’s nothing in the world that could make him want to pull away.

 

✧  ✧  ✧

  

Ronan chokes on a breath, hand flailing out to clutch at the side of his face.  “Adam,” he gasps.  Half-formed tears leak from his eyes. 

Adam’s heart thuds unevenly in his chest.  “Hey.  It’s okay.  I’m here.  You’re okay.”  He swallows.  “Whatever it was, was just a dream.  Just a nightmare.” 

Ronan doesn’t let loose.  Trembling fingertips dig into his hair, searching.  Adam doesn’t know which words he most needs to hear.  It’s possible he’s losing them all to his terror.

“Come here,” he says, and drags him across his chest.  Ronan goes easily, swearing softly.  Burying his face in Adam’s collarbone.  Breath still heaving.

Adam sighs.  He’d love to be able to chase away Ronan’s pain, but he settles for holding him as close as he can.  One arm tight around him, the other tracing meaningless patterns along the wide expanse of his back.

The tremors finally settle.  When Ronan speaks, his voice is rough.  His hands cling to Adam’s sides.  “It was November again.  We were back on the side of that road.”

And he knows where this is going.  Well, not _exactly_ —but he’s had his own fair share of nightmare replays from that day.  So many horrid events to choose from.  A veritable minefield of trauma.

“Gansey was dead already, but somehow the demon… fucking wasn’t.  I don’t know how it happened.  Dreams never make any goddamn sense.  But the sacrifice didn’t work right.  The demon got to Cabeswater first.  It did something to—fuck.  Infect it, I guess?”

“Whatever it was, that part got carried over—even after Gansey.  So when I…  When I asked Cabeswater to sacrifice itself, it didn’t take.  It didn’t work.  Gansey was still fucking dead.  But then it…  I-it took you with it.”

“What?” Adam asks.  He can’t make sense of anything right now.  Because Ronan’s talking about one of his worst nightmares, unprompted.  And that—that’s so unusual an occurrence, he doesn’t even know where to start.

“Gansey was fucking gone.  Cabeswater was gone.  And the demon, it did something.  I don’t know what the fucking _shit_ it was, but it… reversed the link between you and the forest.  Corrupted it.  I begged Cabeswater for help and…  And when it died it— _fuck._ ” 

Adam trails a hand along the soft fuzz on Ronan’s scalp, down his spine, and back again.  As soothing and entreating a motion as he can make it. 

When he finally continues, his words are wet.  “ _You_ died, Adam.  It ruined you.  One last _fuck you_ from the universe.  The demon couldn’t destroy me, so it took you instead.”  A shudder rocks its way through him.  “It felt so goddamned real.  You were gone.  It was my fault.  I asked for it, and I fucking lost _everything_.  I lost—”

“Hey,” he interrupts.  “It was a nightmare.  I’m here, okay?” 

Ronan doesn’t answer. 

“I’m here.  And Gansey’s probably veered off the map in some very abandoned part of the Midwest just for the _adventure of it all_.  Blue’s harassing him about directions, but secretly doesn’t want him to stop.  And Henry’s whining about the cell service and what a travesty it is that they don’t have full coverage in the back end of nowhere.” 

“There’ll be seventeen new posts on Instagram as soon as they get to a place with wi-fi.  You won’t look at your phone, but eventually you’ll ask what the _Tri-Dick Tournament_ ’s up to.  So I’ll show them to you anyway.”  

He brings their entwined hands to his mouth, gently planting a kiss atop his knuckles.  “We’re _fine_.  It’s okay.”

Ronan exhales messily, a gust of hot breath on Adam’s skin.  He burrows closer, tucking their angles together as tightly as he can.  “It will be,” he murmurs.

 


	3. connection

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally, some more of those tags are coming into play :D   
> 
> 
> cw: sexual content   
>  (not _super_ explicit imo but there are questionable jokes)   
>    
> 
> 
>   
> 

_Can we recover_  
_Can we get over this_  
_Are we too frozen inside to feel the flame_  

 

Adam’s newfound freedom is an exercise in contradictions.  It’s just as he’d assumed.  It isn’t at all what he expected.  It’s exactly what he thought he needed.  It’s far from enough.  He’s right where he wanted to be.  It isn’t home.  He isn’t there to make friends.  The isolation’s corroding his soul.  His future’s wide open.  Nothing feels within reach.  

He’s happy.

He’s not. 

What an odd brand of dissatisfaction, having everything he’s worked so hard for, and yet still craving more.   

It’s the things he never could have thought to want—had never factored into a plan staunchly constructed on the grounds of _get out_ —that Adam misses most.  The family he chose for himself.  The magic.  The incredible warmth of love.  _Ronan_.  

Such a shame he can’t have it both ways.  He’s pretty well free to do what he wants.  But that applies to things like class schedules and divvying up his free time, not uprooting Singer’s Falls five hundred fifty miles northeast. 

This school’s laid more opportunity before him than he imagined, but Adam’s ever-constant drive to bend himself into something worthy of that arm-gnawing ambition leads him down familiar paths.  He spends more time studying than he thought he would.  Less time sleeping.  It’s not the mind-numbing hell of maintaining valedictorian and three part-time jobs amidst magical adventures on barely enough food to survive, but it isn’t easy.  And without the company of his friends to brighten the spaces between, it’s lonelier. 

Which isn’t to say he hasn’t made friends.  He has… what normal people might consider friends.  It’s just that _this_ version of Adam knows there’s more to be had.  The wonder of an inextricably tight-knit group of people who’d lay down their lives for one another.  It’s true that that had taken some getting used to, before.  To let people in when his father made isolation a non-negotiable requisite of survival.  But now? 

Now, he’s stuck in this weird middle ground where everything pales in comparison to what he already has.  People approach him, strike up conversations, seem eager to impress him—maybe even to befriend him.  He doesn’t understand it.  He knows he’s never mastered Gansey’s charm or the polite guise of interest necessary for social grace.  But he lets himself accept it in degrees.

So he isn’t alone.  It’s just that the people here don’t know him— _can’t_ really.  And he misses being understood.  Being around people who know about the magic in the world; that he was once a part of it.  That maybe, with Ronan, he still sort of is. 

The truth is, it bothers him how much he has to lie.  Not just about his parents—about everything.  So many stories to strip down, cut up, and cobble back together.  So many redirections, glaring omissions, and outright lies. 

He’d stopped having to pretend in front of _them_.  Is that why it matters so much now?  Because he’s been spoiled by the luxury of being known?

Or maybe Ronan’s just rubbed off on him.  Adam smiles.  He can hear his voice, low and mischievous in his head:  _nice choice of words there, Parrish._

He clings to that life however he can.  Every time Gansey’s name flashes across his phone, he feels a fresh rush of gratitude.  Relief that the bond between them hadn’t dissolved as he once feared it might.  Looking back, he can sympathize.  Gansey knew he was going to die.  He was trying to set things in order, to stop them from imploding in his absence.  What a terrible, lonesome burden that must have been.  Of course it would wreak havoc on his perspective.  And they’re close again now.  That’s what matters.  Adam tracks the threesome’s adventures through calls and texts and voicemails and photographs, holding fast the bits of his heart he’s given away. 

Ronan holds the others.  Adam misses him more than he ever thought possible.  Every shred of communication they have is _everything_ to him.  But it’s not enough.  Nothing will ever compare to having him beside him. 

But for all that Ronan doesn’t actually make the trip, he sends pieces of himself through the mail.  Thoughtful things.  Funny things.  Things Adam never would have guessed he needed until he’s holding them in his hands.  All charming reminders that he still has a home in his thoughts and in his heart.  

Scraps of fine paper attend the dubiously wrapped packages, often scribbled over with lines of violently penned Latin poetry.  Ronan’s fond of Catullus, the least surprising part about any of it.

This time, though…  This time, he’s clearly trying to kill Adam.  He could have gone a lifetime without seeing that last message.  And for Ronan to send it _now_ , of all times?

It’s obscene.  It’s exhilarating.  It’s _completely_ uncalled for.  He’s been flushed for hours, he’s sure of it.  And it has nothing to do with the cold.  Though he’d long since shoved the note in a drawer— _too late_ _—_ the words had etched their way into his brain. 

_sed domi maneas paresque nobis_  
_novem continuas fututiones._  
_Verum si quid ages, statim iubeto:_  
_nam pransus iaceo et satur supinus_  
_pertundo tunicamque palliumque._  ( [→](http://moreraventhanothers.tumblr.com/private/169565216003/tumblr_p2dgijuSWa1vyehle) )

Thoughts eaten alive by searing flashes of skin and sound and possibility, Adam is burning.  He’s wanted to take that next step for months now, but was always too… _something_ to ask.  

Not afraid, exactly.  Concerned, probably.  That Ronan would hear him asking for more and assume what they had wasn’t enough for Adam.  And that wasn’t it.  God, that wasn’t it at _all_. 

He’s more than content with what they’ve done.  Miles of bare skin, pressed together in all the right places.  Gasping for air between desperate kisses.  The feel of Ronan against him.  Hands pressing, plying, probing—utterly unraveling him in return.  His mouth, working wonders.  Hips grinding at devastating angles, bodies crushing together.  The echoes of pleasure, of wanting, of warmth. 

Adam loves what they have.  It’s just… if the option of _more_ were on the table, he’d gladly take that, too.  He’s always felt so greedy for Ronan. 

_Shit_.  Adam has barely a week left to study for his first finals, and now he can’t concentrate for five minutes without— 

Without increasingly detailed scenarios of—  

_Fucking Ronan_ , he thinks.  Everything about this is hideously unfair.  Who hits on their boyfriend with explicit Latin poetry?  Especially when they’re over five hundred miles away and—  The _last_ thing he needs to be thinking about right now is whether Ronan meant it as a serious offer.

“What part of _finals are next week_ did you not understand, asshole?” demands Adam when he calls that night. 

A thoughtful hum crackles across the line.  “Pretty sure that was the point, Parrish.” 

“You shouldn’t be _trying_ to distract me, dickhead.  You know I’m stressed enough as it is.  Jesus, I didn’t need this shit from you right now.”

“I wasn’t trying to _distract_ you, fuckface.  I’m trying to help you.”  Adam scoffs.  “ _And_ ,” Ronan speaks over the sound.  “You’re gonna be home in nine days.  I’m _trying_ to remind you that you have something to look forward to.  But hey, if you’re not interested, fuck you.  Or…  _Un_ -fuck you.  Whatever.”

“You’re impossible.”

“Good thing you like a challenge.”

He huffs out a laugh.  “Nine more days.” 

“You’ll knock ‘em dead, Einstein.”  Adam’s not so sure he agrees.  He doesn’t feel up to overcoming _anything_ , frazzled as he is.  “You will.  And when you’re done, you’re coming back here, and I can give you your fucking reward.”

“Ronan.”  He doesn’t know what his voice carries over the line.  What kind of mortifying hunger.  All he knows is he wants _now_.  To see Ronan, hold him, smell him, kiss him.  To be back in his bed instead of at this cold, hard desk.  It’s been too long. 

“Go study, Adam.”

“Funny, how you act concerned about that _now_.”

“Did you even get to what was inside, or were you too distracted by your blue balls?” 

“I’m gonna hang up on you.”

“Seriously Parrish, open the goddamn bag.  Use the highlighter; they go together.  I hope it helps.”

“O- _kaaa_ y,” he responds, mystified.

“And get some motherfucking sleep.  Love you, you ungrateful shit.”  

Adam rolls his eyes.  _I wish you were here_ , he wants to say.  But Ronan’s already ended the call.

And since he’s never once bothered with instructions, Adam doesn’t think much of the lacking explanation.  He just swaps his cheap highlighter for Ronan’s and goes about his business.  The puzzle of it nags at him, buzzing in the back of his mind right up until he remembers the other scrap of information Ronan offered— _they go together._  

Adam reaches for the moss-colored notebook.  Flipping it open with a wary finger, he’s astonished to find a perfect replica of his notes inside.  Everything he’s highlighted—printed or hand-written, fact or figure—has mirrored itself onto its pages, neatly organized by subject.

His heart surges.  There’s no logical explanation for this brand of magic, so he’ll have to use it discreetly.  But that doesn’t mean it won’t save him _hours_ of hand-copying notes into study guides.  And he can carry the notebook with him everywhere; look over its pages whenever he has a chance. 

Unbearable fondness floods through him.  What a wonderful, impossible creature Ronan is.

 

✧  ✧  ✧

 

“Ronan, hey.”  Probably the breathy enthusiasm in his voice should make him uncomfortable.  But he hasn’t spoken to Ronan in days, and they’ll finally get to _see_ each other soon.  _Four whole weeks_.

“When’re you getting here, nerd?” 

Adam struggles to fit his key in the door’s ancient lock without dropping his phone.  Chances are high that Ronan dreamed the thing indestructible along with the permanent signal and charge, but he’d rather not test the theory.  “Just got done with my last exam.  I’m walking into my room right now.” 

“And?  How was it?” 

“Good, I think.  I felt good about all of them.”

“Like there was ever any fucking doubt.  So?” 

“I dunno.  Gotta clean up the dorm.  All these notes and boxes and plates and…  God, how’d it get this _bad_?”

Ronan snorts.  “Man, you’re in a whole ’nother world when you study.  The school could burn down out there and you’d never notice.” 

“I’m not that oblivious.” 

“Keep telling yourself that.” 

“ _Anyway_ , I need to get rid of this mess and take my bags down to the car.  Shouldn’t be too awful long.”

“Make sure your ass is careful.  Forecast this morning said it’s supposed to shit snow on your way through Connecticut and New Jersey.” 

A smile tugs at his lips.  “Really?  It said that?  The weatherman came on Channel 3 and said _it’s shitting snow_?”

“Fuck you, he might have.”

“Unless you’ve gotten a day job in meteorology that you haven’t shared with the class, I suspect not.” 

Ronan ignores him.  “That means traffic’s gonna probably be ass, too.” 

“Mmm, joy.  Thanks for the heads up.” 

“You sure the shitbox can make it, Parrish?  You know it’s not too late to change your mind.  I’ll pick you up.”

Adam wouldn’t be surprised if his eye-roll ascended to another plane of existence where gestures could scream.  He thinks he can hear it, still.  “Shove it, Lynch.  We’ve been over this.  Too many times.  Give it a rest.”

“And yet you _insist_ on being unreasonable about it.  I know my sanity’s worth less to you than your pride, but why in the ever-loving fuck does your stubborn ass actually _want_ to run the risk of wasting a _whole goddamned day_ stranded on the side of some fuckoff highway in Bumfuck, New England?” 

“Ronan,” he says sternly. 

He sighs—a prolonged, forceful thing.  “You act like you don’t know what this is about, Parrish.  Ever consider your asshole boyfriend, just wanting every day with you he can get?”  The words sound like they cost Ronan a great deal to admit.  Like they were torn from him with blunt spikes. 

“That’s—”

“And if I end up having to come get you anyway, just because you _had_ to be a chucklefuck about this…  I guarantee you’re never hearing the end of it.  Not to mention it’s cold as all shit.  If you break down and freeze your dick off, neither one of us is gonna be happy.”  And there it is.  The avalanche of biting sarcasm Ronan buries the least admission of possible vulnerability under.  

“Fortunate that I’m a mechanic, then,” Adam quips.  “You’ve got me for a month.  How is it you’re _still_ complaining?” 

He knows exactly how.  Because it’s not enough.  It’s never going to feel like enough.  Especially after an entire summer spent learning what living with him was like. 

Ronan grunts in lieu of a response. 

“Don’t worry, I’m sure my piece of shit car can hobble its way down to said needy boyfriend’s isolated farm in the middle of nowhere, Bumfuck, Virginia.” 

“Shithead.” 

“Someone’s gotta keep you on your toes.”

“You’ll be keeping me on more than that if you’d hurry your ass up and get here.”

“Jesus, Ronan.” 

“He doesn’t have anything to do with it.  Just you and me and—”

“Hanging up now,” interrupts Adam.  His pulse is thrumming, and he doesn’t plan on spending the better part of twelve hours warring with a boner just because Ronan got a kick out of torturing him.  “I need to get off the phone if I’m ever gonna get on the road.  I’ll see you in ten, or whatever.”

“Yeah, yeah.  Love you, asshole,” he says, and hangs up before Adam can get the chance to not respond.

 

✧  ✧  ✧

 

Ever eager to undermine Ronan’s belligerent doubt, the Hondayota makes the trip back to Singer’s Falls without incident.  And for all his tantalizing suggestions, Ronan doesn’t jump him the moment he walks through the door.  He just shoves Adam’s bags to the floor and crushes him against his chest.

Which is probably for the best.  Traffic and poor weather conditions had conspired to stretch a nine hour trip into over eleven.  He’s exhausted—certain he could doze in Ronan’s arms right there in the hallway if it weren’t for the effort of fighting himself awake.  He’s missed him so damn much. 

Ronan pulls back after a solid minute, a warm smile on his face that hasn’t left it since he opened the door.  “I’ll heat up your dinner.” 

_How domestic_ , Adam thinks to say but doesn’t.  No sense in ruffling his feathers over something he so deeply appreciates.  Leaving his bags to languish in the hall, he follows Ronan to the kitchen and grabs a seat at one of the high stools.  A whirlwind of winged delight promptly settles on the counter in front of him.  Adam puts out a hand to stroke at her neck, and Chainsaw rubs her beak along the back of it in return.

“Where’s Opal?” he asks. 

“OPAL!” shouts Ronan.  There’s hooves clattering down the stairs in an instant.

“Is Adam here yet?” she calls over the noise.

Warmth spreads through Adam’s chest.  Try as he may, he’s never gotten used to this feeling.  Being surrounded with such abundant love.  “In here,” he answers. 

Her steps grow faster.  He’s missed Opal almost as much as he’s missed Ronan.  More, in some ways, because he’s had less contact with her. 

Sure, there are strange gifts sent in care packages.  The pictures and stories Ronan shares at her behest.  Him dragging her over to the phone when she’ll cooperate.  The precious few times she’s called Adam herself.  And he’s seen plenty of her antics captured through the lens of a camera.  But she shares Ronan’s violent distaste for phones, and doesn’t seem as inclined to forgive their imagined wrongdoing for Adam’s sake. 

Chainsaw swoops away, sensing the impending chaos.  Adam prepares himself for an armload of hoof and girl as Opal enters the kitchen.  But she stops a few feet short, catching him off-guard.  “Hi, Opal.”

Her big eyes focus on Adam, calculating.  The expression remains unnerving on a girl who looks about six years old.  “Kerah says I need to be on my best behavior because there’s no way you’re not exhausted.”  Her head tilts.  “Are you?”

The microwave beeps.  Ronan swears.  “What have I told you about calling me that?”

“ _Shithead_ said you were tired and I had to behave.”

Adam does his best not to laugh, but can’t keep from cracking a smile.  Things that also look strange on the girl:  the more abrasive parts of Ronan’s personality.  “I am.  It took a very long time to get back here.  Longer than it should have.  But that doesn’t mean I don’t still want a hug.”

Opal perks up at that and throws herself around Adam’s middle.  “ _Te desidero_ , Adam.  Too much.  Why can’t we see you more often?”

“Opal,” scolds Ronan.  Adam can tell from his tone it’s a well-trod conversation.  His throat feels tight. 

“What?  You want him here too,” she snaps back.  He glares, warning clear in his eyes.  It dissipates as he sets Adam’s plate down in front of him.  The food smells delicious.  Yet another thing he’s missed:  Ronan’s cooking. 

“We’ve talked about this, Opal.  And I’m sure Ronan has, too.  It’s not that I don’t want to.  It’s just…  You understand what college is, right?”

Opal nods solemnly.  “School for old humans who want to learn more.”

“Right.  Well.  So there are hundreds of places like that all over the country.  The one I go to has an excellent reputation.  There are these groups that decide which colleges are supposed to be the best, and mine stays in the top two year after year.  Which means it’s really hard to get picked to go, because so many people want to.  And since there are so many students to choose from, the people that run the college know the people who _do_ get in are very determined and very smart.”

“So, the classes are difficult on purpose.  They expect you to put in the work and keep up.  Which means I have to study a lot.  And there are lots of assignments and things.  You know how Ronan always complained about actually having to do his homework?”

She nods again. 

“It’s way worse than that,” he says, ruffling her hair conspiratorially.  

“Satisfied?” Ronan asks.  “I’ve only told you so about a hundred thousand times.  This one gonna stick?” 

But Opal’s still looking at Adam like he’s a puzzle to be solved.  “You used to have three jobs _and_ go to school.  You still came over then.”  And he swears he can feel his heart breaking in two.

Adam’s mouth opens; no words come out.  Abstract concepts like distance and obligations were not easy ones to articulate.  How can he make her understand that he wants to be here—but in order to build the rest of the life he wants, he can’t be?  He doesn’t think he can explain that to a fully-formed adult, much less to Opal.  He’s not even sure how he’s justifying it to himself.  Under close inspection, his future’s pulling him in two disparate directions.  But he’s unwilling to sacrifice Ronan being a part of it.

“Goddamn it, Opal.  Leave him alone.  We’ve talked about this.  This isn’t some pissy high school bullshit.   And there’s a big-ass difference between living fifteen miles away and fucking five hundred fifty.  If you want to see him more often, come over when I’m talking to him instead of being a brat about it.”

Her lip wobbles for a moment, and Adam still doesn’t know what to say.  Ronan’s only coming to his defense.  He’s not yelling, but the words are brittle.  Adam wishes he’d find a way to soften the truth instead of throwing it out like knives as he usually does.  Probably easier said than done, with Ronan’s own prickly feelings tied up in the matter. 

She turns to Adam again, considering.  Opal’s face is absent any offense—years of experience garnering her resistance to Ronan’s attitude.  She’s well used to his thorns.  “You’ll be here in the morning?”

He smiles weakly.  “A month of them.”

Opal brightens.  “I’ll see you tomorrow, then.  If Ronan lets you out of bed.”  She says it so casually, Adam chokes on his food.

Mortified, he stares at Ronan as she tromps back up the stairs.  “How much does she know?” he hisses.

Unfazed, he shrugs.  “Enough, seems like.  To be fair, she _did_ come out of my head.  I think she knows a lot more than she should about a lot of things.” 

It isn’t until Adam’s lying in that bed—stomach full, warm from the shower, and well on his way to sleep—that he realizes he hasn’t kissed Ronan.  “C’mere,” he murmurs drowsily, pulling him closer.  Their mouths slot together, and it feels like coming home.  “Can’t believe I almost didn’t even kiss you.”

He smiles fondly, tracing Adam’s jaw with a gentle thumb.  “It’s okay, Parrish.  I know you’re exhausted.” 

“I am.  But I still want—” 

Ronan cuts him off with another kiss.  “Don’t be an idiot.  Sleep.  There’ll be plenty of time for that when you can actually keep your eyes open.”

He’s right, of course.  So Adam stops fighting, and lets them close to a soft declaration of love.  He’s asleep in moments.

 

✧  ✧  ✧

 

Ronan sags heavily against the edge of the bed.  Adam never could have imagined a day so perfect as this one.  Between the eldest Lynches getting along, Matthew’s sunny disposition, Opal’s bouyant energy, and Chainsaw’s clear glee…  Something had settled within him.  The contentment Ronan wore like a second skin.  Adam’s own quiet satisfaction. 

There had been breakfast and presents, snowball fights and dinner, movies and hot chocolate, and snuggling beneath blankets beside a blazing fire.  The happiness, the love, the _home_ Adam had often doubted he would ever find.  Finally, Christmas had meant the things it was supposed to.  Togetherness.  Celebration.  Joy. 

None of that tracks with Ronan’s guarded stance beside him.  Smelling of expensive body wash and something distinctly _him_ , he’s fiddling with a small package.  But he looks equally likely to throw the box out the window as to give it to Adam. 

He doesn’t know what to expect.  The other gifts had been unwrapped earlier beside the Christmas tree.  A single-serve coffee maker and months’ worth of coffee to go with it.  A travel mug heinously marred with a _squash one, squash two_ engraving, and a host of fine school supplies that looked to have cost a small fortune.  Adam knew they’d only cost Ronan a night of dreams.

It was a lot.  It was far more than enough.  But—while Matthew was fussing over his new game console—he’d leaned over and whispered into Adam’s ear.  “There’s one more.  I’ll give it to you tonight.” 

Ronan was ruining him.  That was the only logical explanation for how fast his mind went to the single most inappropriate possibility.  Of course, the bastard noticed the flush in his cheeks and smirked.  Then proceeded to _waggle his eyebrows_ —a move Adam had, up until then, suspected no one had ever actually performed or witnessed in real life. 

That self-sure bravado is missing now, replaced by uncertain vulnerability.  _What’s making him so nervous?_   It’s not like Adam would object to anything Ronan had thought to give him.  Or like he’d ever reject it.  Unless… 

Suddenly his mind’s dragging him through tortuous possibilities stained with thousands of dollars, blown without care.  Ronan wouldn’t do that.  

He doesn’t _think_ Ronan would do that. 

Adam’s grown more comfortable accepting things from him.  From Ronan, who would never hold anything against him, who would never demand anything in return.  But surely he knows better than to…  _Jesus Christ_.  Is it car keys?  Is _that_ why he’d been so adamant he not drive the Hondayota here?  He’s going to kill him.  Adam is going to _kill_ Ronan. 

Ronan’s breath escapes in a gust of nerves and resolve.  Hand unsteady, he holds out the box.  Adam hesitates, running through the words to tell him that on no uncertain terms is this remotely acceptable.  That he can shove all that money up his ass, because Adam wants no part of it.  And how _dare_ he ruin this day by pulling such a shitty, thoughtless stunt?  Ronan should know him better than this.  He should know—

The package is feather-light in his hands.  His faith slowly filters back where it belongs.  But adrenaline’s still twined in his heartbeat as he unwraps the golden paper.  

Inside it lies the most handsome bracelet he’s ever seen in his life.  It’s clearly a dream thing, fashioned artfully in earthy materials.  As slender as it is, the wood’s curvature defies reason.  It looks impossible.  Impossibly elegant. 

Adam knows it’ll hug his wrist like a glove.  Like it was made for it.  Because it so clearly was.  Intricate designs play over the intimate stretch of dark wood.  Branches and leaves and forests and…  _Cabeswater_.  It reminds him so distinctly of Cabeswater.  Sumptuous twists of leather tie it all together

He runs a thumb over the engraved lines and feels a rush of warmth so strong, it nearly takes his breath away.  Of… _Ronan_.  An unflinching blow of how he must feel about him.  Adam’s eyes slip closed.  He recognizes the effusive longing, the boundless passion, the fierce love for what they all are—precisely the way he feels for Ronan in return. 

The hungry edge recedes after a moment, leaving behind a tender sense of comfort.  Of feeling Ronan right beside him.  Of basking in his unquestionable devotion for Adam.  Of knowing that he’s not alone.  That he never will be, if Ronan has anything to say about it.

His eyes open to that same strange, unsettled version of Ronan.  He’s chewing on his own bracelets, looking more anxious by the minute.  “Look, I know it’s a lot.  You probably can’t wear it while you’re at work and—  Hell, you don’t even wear jewelry in the first place.  I just thought, maybe…  If you ever got homesick…  If you were ever missing me…” 

Adam can’t fathom Ronan second-guessing himself this badly.  How incredibly unlike him, to retreat so quickly from a decision he’s made.  “Shut up, idiot.  I love it.”  _I love you_ , he thinks. 

A fraction of his mouth quirks.  The fraction is pleased, but he still can’t quite meet Adam’s eyes.  “It’s not enough.  Never will be.  I want to give you the world.” 

And Adam knows he would, if he could.  He knocks his shoulder against Ronan’s.  “All I’m asking for is you.” 

“Sap,” he responds, not unkindly.  And it is.  It’s the sappiest thing he’s ever uttered in his life.  But…

“You started it,” he murmurs, lips brushing Ronan’s.  And they’re kissing.

 

✧  ✧  ✧

 

“I want to have sex with you.”

“Is that so?”  His response is bone dry.  “And what, exactly the hell, is it you think we’re doing right now?”

He has a point, but far be it from Adam to admit that out loud. 

“Asshole,” he mutters.  He feels the edge of Ronan’s grin against his shoulder, fierce and delighted.

Adam restrains a sigh with monumental effort.  The other words— _I want to fuck you_ —feel too harsh to wrap his mouth around.  Trust Ronan to make it inevitable. 

“Shut up,” he breathes out against the force of his shifting hips.  The indecent friction of Ronan’s skin on his is absolutely unbearable.  Adam wants to drown in it.

“Hey, genius.  You’re the one with the finger up my ass.  Thought that was pretty self-explanatory, myself.”

“Ronan,” he grits out.  “You know _damn well_ what I mean.”

He feels fingers tightening in his hair.  Ronan’s mouth, hot and open at his throat.  The sweet torture of nearly every inch of him pressed up against Adam.  The sinuous movements of his coiled muscles, shifting beneath his hands.

His lips wander to the shell of Adam’s ear, slow and deliberate.  “Do I?” he murmurs.  There’s no hiding the full-body shiver that follows. Adam can feel himself tumbling down the deep well of distraction. 

Ronan has a way of making him forget every thought that might have ever been in his head.  And he doesn’t want to get side-tracked.  Not when he’s finally worked up the nerve to ask.  But Ronan never stops.  His ability to multitask with all things _Adam_ rivals Adam’s own skill at crafting something marvelous and whole from the splintered puzzle pieces of people and places and responsibilities in his life. 

He still makes no overtures toward a real response.  “So?” Adam tries again.

“So _what_?” he murmurs against his skin.

“ _So_ , do you have any input?”

He pulls back, smiling viciously.  “Are you actually _trying_ to set these jokes up for me, Parrish?”

He can’t hold back the sigh this time.  “Don’t you find it exhausting, the effort you go through to be this level of impossible?”

“Nah.  Comes naturally.” 

Adam just stares.

“Honestly, I’m impressed it took you this long to ask, you horny bastard.” 

One of his eyebrows creeps skyward. 

“What do you _think_?” says Ronan, dripping sarcasm. 

“No.  Nuh-uh.  We’re not playing that game.  You’re using your words.  Tell me what you want.”

“ _Oh baby oh baby_ ,” Ronan deadpans.  Adam cuffs him on the shoulder, earning himself a serpentine smile.

“Yes, Adam.  I want that too.” 

Which still doesn’t _technically_ answer the question he has in mind, but he figures that’s on him for dancing around it.  “Are you okay with…” he trails off, moving a finger meaningfully against him.

“Christ, are you going to fuck me, or are we just gonna sit around all night and talk about it?” 

Adam answers with a bruising kiss.

Minutes later, Ronan’s splayed face-down on the mattress beneath him and… _God_.  As with so much of their intimate time together, he spends it caught between the sheer disbelief that this is real—this is reality, Adam Parrish’s real life that he’s built for himself—and cataloging every sensation.  Every sound that slips out of his mouth.

And shit, it’s not like they haven’t done this before.  Ronan’s transparent fascination with his hands proves hard to ignore, and Adam has zero interest in doing so.  It’s just that it’s never been a stepping stone for _this_.  Opening him up for something more.  Even the slightest action feels incredibly charged.  Dangerous.  He takes his time, restrained by latent caution and loath to risk anything less than meticulous preparation. 

“Parrish.  Get on with it.”  Takes _too_ long, apparently.

Adam drags his teeth along Ronan’s neck, finding delight in the tremor that seizes his spine.  “Never thought I’d see the day when Ronan Lynch would complain about me using my hands,” he murmurs. 

“Why use your hands when your dick could be put to better use?”

“So help me, if you ever insinuate that about my mouth, we’re breaking up.”

“Duly noted.  Do not, under any circumstances, tell Parrish how good he is with his mouth.”

He’s ridiculous.  Adam’s eyes roll in fond exasperation.  A beat later, Ronan offers an unrepentant _oops_.  With his face pressed against the mattress, Adam can’t _see_ his shit-eating grin, but he sure can hear it.

He moves back, figuring he may as well put Ronan out of his misery.  Trailing the fingers of his dry hand along the path cut by a dark vine, he digs for courage.  As much as he’s wanted this, as much as he _does_ want this…  The prospect is still terrifying.  “How do you want to do this?” 

“Well shit, I thought that was pretty obvious.  Step one.”  Ronan flings a blind hand in the direction of his nightstand.  Follows it with a lewd gesture involving an index finger and circled thumb.  “Step two.  Really failing to see where the confusion is.”

Adam pinches his ass, hard.  

On some level, he can appreciate that Ronan isn’t being awkward and uncomfortable about this.  But would it kill him to take it a little more seriously?  Surely the joking is just his way of defusing the gravity of the situation, but…  This is important to Adam.  It has to mean as much to him, right?  Because Ronan hasn’t done this, either.  Because he loves— 

Ronan uses his quiet crisis as an opportunity to flop onto his back.  And now that Adam can see his face, there’s no doubt.  His expression is one of pure conviction.  “I want to see you,” he says, all traces of humor gone.  And that…  _Shit._  

He’s fumbling to get a condom on.  The two tries it takes leave Adam feeling clumsy.  Inept.  But the look in Ronan’s eyes is all hunger.

Then Adam’s moving over him, and there’s a moment…  There’s a moment where he’s so terribly sure it isn’t going to work.  That, despite his best efforts, they won’t be able to do this.  Because he can’t possibly hurt him as much as it seems like he’ll have to.  Then Ronan cants his hips up, and—

Adam is only pretty sure he’s not going to die on the spot.

_Hot._

_Tight._

_Ronan._

_Goddamn_ —his brain is shorting out. 

“Are you good?” he manages, out of breath.

“Yeah.  Move, damn it.”  Ronan bucks his hips and— _shit._  

Adam darts a hand toward his thigh, pressing down.  “Don’t.  Just.  Give me a minute, or this ain’t gonna last more than that.”  Nothing had prepared him for this. 

He’s ridiculously glad he jacked off in the shower earlier.  Having come to terms with Ronan’s ruthless teasing and innuendo…  Knowing he wouldn’t be able to touch him for hours— _days_ even, if Ronan gave a damn about not being overheard—Adam had done what he could to keep from dissolving into a horny, touch-starved wreck under the watchful eyes of the Lynch brothers.  The incident in the kitchen at Thanksgiving had been bad enough. 

It might be the only thing that saves him from going over the edge.  It’s enough.  The traction he needs to get a handle on his restraint.  And he loses himself in Ronan and a blissful white haze of pleasure.

Words keep bubbling up in his throat.  Every thrust feels like it takes something from deep within him.  But every fractured sound spilling into the air reminds him what he’s getting in return.  Being as close to Ronan as he can possibly be— _God_.  It’s vital.  He wants to say something.  He _needs_ to say something. 

“Ronan,” he starts, but falters.  Always faltering.  _Why can’t he just_ say _it?_   In the space of his hesitation, Ronan’s mouth covers his.  Opportunity lost; _nerve_ lost.  

Adam holds the words inside him.  This shouldn’t be the first time he says them, anyway.  Not when Ronan might not even believe he means it.  _I love you, I love you, I love you_.  It’s a litany he’s choking down again and again. 

Oblivious to his turmoil, Ronan digs his heels in.  “Harder.  You’re not gonna fucking break me,” he growls.  Adam huffs out a breath that might be a laugh and might be an unchecked moan.  

He gives him what he asked for.  And it doesn’t take much longer to lose his firm grip on control.  Ronan responds in kind, letting loose a stretching, elastic _Adam_ that’s sure to haunt him for months.

He drifts off that night to the slow serenity of Ronan’s hand, softly roaming through his hair.  

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was probably A Lot - but it's my favorite by far. So if you feel like leaving a comment, it would make me incredibly happy to hear your thoughts!


	4. trip switch

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope y'all can keep up with the time switches here, because it's gonna get much worse ;) The "present" parts take place during Adam's freshman winter break, and the "past" is Jan/Feb after the events of TRK   
> 

_Empty vapor_  
_Where there used to be our fuel_  

 

Adam cannot, in good conscience, call waking up naked in Ronan’s bed a novel experience.  But waking in his bed before sunrise without clothes and _without Ronan_ —that one’s new. 

It’s an unpleasant feeling he’s not sure he’s up to examining.  A quick survey of his expectations tells him it’s not that he assumed last night would change anything, really.  But that’s exactly it. 

Their other firsts had been followed by late mornings and early afternoons.  Jumbled limbs and a kind of contentment Adam had never found the words to describe.  How odd it is, then, that _this_ one should be any different. 

For a moment, he doesn’t move.  Staring at the white ceiling, thoughts purposefully blank.  Telling himself Ronan might come back.  One minute where he doesn’t press a hand to the other side of the bed.  Doesn’t find it cold. 

Adam rations off a single sigh and pushes himself to standing. 

There _is_ a Lynch downstairs, though it’s not the one he’s hoping for.  Quite the opposite.  Heat pricks its way up his neck.  Adam wonders if it still counts as a walk of shame if he lives here.  If Ronan’s the one who stole away in the middle of the night. 

But it’s not shame he feels.  He just hadn’t expected to have to deal with Declan alone.  Is it written all over him?  Stamped into his skin like the bruises scattered along his collarbone?  _I took your brother’s virginity last night._   

Adam rejects that thought the second it enters his head.  They’ve been having sex for months, haven’t they?  Just… not like _that._  

Declan hasn’t noted his presence, attention monopolized by the computer in his lap.  Adam considers backing out of the room while he still has the chance.  “Mornin’,” he greets instead.

“Adam,” he acknowledges.

“You wouldn’t’a’ happened to seen Ronan around anywhere?”  _That_ , on the other hand, does drench him in embarrassment.  He winces.  Speech littered with dropped consonants and lengthy vowels—it’s obvious Adam needed a few more hours of rest.  And some coffee.  And maybe not to open his mouth again until he gets one of the two. 

He’s slowly come to terms with Ronan’s strange fascination with his accent.  But that doesn’t mean he feels comfortable sounding so _Henrietta_ in front of his polished brother.  Especially lacking any guarantee said brother didn’t overhear them last night.  Ronan hadn’t been what any reasonable person might call quiet. 

For his part, Declan doesn’t react.  _He likes you, Parrish.  You’d catch that fake-ass bullshit a mile away if he didn’t.  Condescending motherfucker._   Maybe Ronan was right.  Adam would prefer the cool indifference over his pretentious politician routine any day.

Left to his own devices, Declan wasn’t congenial.  That was a full-bodied lie he slipped on and off like one of his suits.  Well-worn and insulating, as much a cloak of armor as his brother’s thick layers of venom.

“I’ve not, no.  He got up…  At least an hour ago?”  Declan’s nose crinkles.  “Too early to be traipsing down the hall, at any rate.  Little shithead _knows_ where the noisy boards are.  And yet he just _happened_ to step on the one outside my door, twice.  I couldn’t get back to sleep after that.”  He sighs, finally lifting his eyes from the screen.  “Is he having trouble sleeping again?”

“I… dunno,” Adam admits.  “He’s been there when I woke up the last couple of days.  But I guess it’s possible he hadn’t really slept.”  And because that feels like a failing somehow, he adds, “I sleep a lot better here.  Been out like a light.”

“Well, when you find him, feel free to pass along that he’s being a terrible host.  Considering he woke us all up, the least he could do is be in here cooking breakfast.  Not,” he gestures widely, “out there gallivanting with the livestock.” 

His lips quirk into a smile.  “Sure he’ll appreciate that.”

“I do try,” Declan responds, and Adam feels effectively dismissed.

He shrugs on his coat and shoes, slings a dream lantern over a shoulder, and heads outside.  Whatever Declan may have assumed, Ronan’s nowhere to be found.  Given the biting temperature, he’s not terribly surprised.  But the hush that’s settled deeply over the fields, that _is_ odd.  Because sound carries in the frosty air, and it _isn’t_.

Adam stalks toward a building at random, hands jammed in his pockets to ward off the chill.  The third barn’s the charm.  He’s struck by how warm it is inside, considering the lack of animals.  _Dream heat_ , he suspects.  Ronan’s not likely to have wasted the energy on an unoccupied barn otherwise. 

He finds Opal tucked into a round chair in the tack room.  She points behind her when Adam steps inside.  “Back there,” she says.  There’s something to her tone and the set of her eyebrows that tells him Ronan’s doing something he shouldn’t.  He swiftly prepares for disaster.

Anxiety assaults him with unsavory potential.  Images of Ronan:  Drinking himself stupid.  Dreaming something unmanageable.  _Hurting himself_.  Lying injured and alone for hours.  

But… he hasn’t wrestled those demons for months, has he?  Adam _thinks_ he hasn’t.  The gnawing possibility that he’s wrong—that Ronan’s been struggling this whole time and not felt like he could _tell him about it_ —kicks like a gunshot.

Still, he can’t imagine what else Ronan could have gotten himself into at 6:30 AM in the back of a barn that even _Opal_ wouldn’t approve of.  Especially when he should be back in bed, curled around Adam.

Dread hollows his stomach as he pushes open the door.  Fear of what he’ll find.  But it’s only Ronan, stretched across a wide fabric hammock in the back corner of the room.  He’s unconscious, sprawled sideways over the sling like he never meant to fall asleep.  And he’s perfectly okay. 

Relief and anger flood through Adam in equal measure.  _What the fuck?_   Frustration burns hot in his chest, his throat, the tips of his fingers.  He has an overwhelming urge to throw something at the bastard.  For worrying him.  For being out here in the first place.  For abandoning Adam in his bed—something he’s apparently not getting over any time soon.  He doesn’t know why it bothers him so badly, but it _hurts_.  It’s such a shitty thing for Ronan to have done, and for what looks like no reason at all.  The longer he contemplates it, the more annoyed he gets. 

It’s sheer coincidence that he spots a kickball amongst the clutter on the floor.  He scoops it up, takes a second to aim, and nails Ronan squarely in the gut with it.  The result is a glorious train wreck.  He flails in surprise, the forceful motion unsettling the fabric beneath him.  It heaves sideways, dumping Ronan unceremoniously to the ground.  He crashes onto his ass with a distinct _thump_.  

“ _Owwww_ ,” he hisses, wincing.  And he has the gall to stare at Adam, a wounded expression of betrayal slashed across his face.  “What the fuck?” 

“Huh.  Look at that.  Took the words right out of my mouth,” responds Adam, acid in his voice.  Ronan has the grace to look embarrassed, then.  And abruptly guilty.  Which somehow makes him _more_ annoyed.  Why the hell would Ronan come out here, if he knew he’d feel bad about it?  He could have easily saved himself and Adam both the trouble.  “What are you doing out here?” 

Ronan doesn’t answer for a long moment.  He just peers at Adam, something complicated churning in his eyes.  It’s a twisted cocktail of thoughts he can’t track.  “Couldn’t sleep,” he admits at length.

“So you decided to sleep out here instead?”  It isn’t quite what he’s thinking—a string of increasingly convoluted swears that would probably make the shithead proud.  That, and _that’s never stopped you before, asshole._   He’d always been content to stay in bed so long as Adam was there with him.  Tangled together, soft and warm.  It’s hard to convince himself that something isn’t wrong.

Ronan looks at the ground.  “I…  I came out and worked for a few hours.  I didn’t mean to fall asleep, not like that.  I guess I tired myself out.”

“Clearly,” remarks Adam.  He does look drained.  But he sounds so distracted.  He thinks again, of Ronan’s odd distance the night before.  How quiet he got after they slept together.  Did he do something wrong?  Say something wrong?  _Does he regret what they did?_

Adam wants to tell him—  _What?_  — That they don’t have to do it again if he doesn’t want to?  That he’s sorry?

Except he isn’t.  Sorry.  Really.  He wants to be with Ronan again.  And he doesn’t know how to broach the subject without it sounding like he _doesn’t_.  So he decides to say nothing at all.  Act like nothing’s changed.  Let Ronan choose how he wants to handle it, and hope the answer isn’t _poorly_. 

They regard each other in silence, neither willing to surrender anything more.  Adam steps forward, feeding a wordless message through his approach.  ( _Talk to me.  Please just talk to me_.)  Ronan’s eyes close against the gentle hand he scrubs over his scalp.  

Adam exhales.  “Declan said I should come tell you you’re being a shitty host.  I’m inclined to agree.  You’re out here just dicking around while your guests go hungry.” 

Ronan huffs out a laugh.  “Are you actually asking me to cook you breakfast right now?  Is this a real conversation?” 

He shrugs.  “I’m telling you I’m hungry, and your brothers might appreciate you surprising them with a little hospitality.  You can decide what to do with that.” 

Ronan clambers to his feet in a bold, violent motion.  Adam stands his ground, not sure what to expect.  More of an argument, probably.  But Ronan traps his mouth against his, and his mind blanks all over again. 

Adam doesn’t understand how it’s possible.  They’ve been a _them_ for over a year now and yet... every time their lips meet, it feels like the first.  Like he’ll never be able to get enough.  

He’s on fire.  Drowning in the vast depths of his feelings for this idiot.  Completely, wholly overwhelmed.  Right up until Ronan murmurs, directly into his good ear:  _I’ll give you something to eat_.  

Adam shoves him back.  “Gross.  I know you were technically raised in a barn, but—  Seriously?  You _just_ said you’ve been out here for hours.  You’re taking a shower before I’m going anywhere near you.  Not to mention it’s twenty degrees outside.  We are _not_ having sex in this barn, you animal.” 

“That your final answer?”

“Yes!  _God_.  Opal’s probably still just on the other side of that wall.  Stop thinking with your dick.” 

“Don’t worry, Parrish,” he says, smirk locked firmly in place.  Then the bastard palms him through his sweatpants.  “I’ll think with yours.”

Adam can’t help it—a surprised laugh rockets from his mouth.  And Ronan grins like he’s won some kind of award.  Right before he turns on his heel, marching out of the barn with a self-satisfied confidence that could only be borne of loving spite.  Adam’s left bewildered and more than a little turned on.  Amiably annoyed that Ronan flipped the tables on him so fast.

One thing’s for sure, he thinks.  Whatever’s going on with Ronan, it’s not that he doesn’t still want Adam.

  

✧  ✧  ✧

 

The first confession is an all-out disaster.  He can’t remember what brought it on, or if anything even did.  Just that they were at St. Agnes—Ronan sprawled across his bed; Adam at his desk.  That it happened faster than he expected.  That it happened far too soon.

When Ronan says the words, he doesn’t look surprised.  Doesn’t look scared, or sorry, or shaken.  Only steady and sincere.

Adam thinks he might have flinched.  Lost in the aftermath of Ronan’s voice, he— 

_doesn’t understand anything_

His thoughts are stalling out. 

The key’s in the ignition.  The engine’s

_turning_  
_turning  
_ _turning_

getting nowhere in the end.

“Get that goddamn look off your face.” 

_What look?_   

Adam can’t fathom the haphazard muscular impulses his body’s indulging while his brain’s on walkabout.  Ronan’s scowl, though, echoes what must be carved into his expression:  something terrible.  

Not the reaction he might have hoped for.  Not the reaction he _should_ be having, the first time he hears the words.

“Jesus Mary, Adam.  Don’t…”  He clutches the bridge of his nose like he’s trying to ward off a migraine.  “Don’t ask me to take it back.  I’m not—”  There’s a certain resolve to Ronan’s frustration.  “I _won’t_.” 

“I don’t—” 

_want you to_   
_know how to handle this_   
_think I’m ready_   
_know what to say_

“I know,” Ronan sighs, looking out the dilapidated window.  His fingers dig at his leather bracelets, twisting this way and that.  “I know you don’t.”  Adam follows his gaze.  The night is dark and cloudless, broken only by the faint glow of the streetlights below. 

_Brutal and clear_. 

“You don’t have to say anything, all right?  I don’t expect you to—  _Fuck_.  I don’t want anything _from_ you.”  His eyes meet Adam’s once again.  

_Selfless and sure_. 

“I just want you to know.  You fucking need to _know_ , okay?  You deserve to be loved, Parrish, and you damn well fucking deserve to hear about it.”

His first mistake:  not assuming it would come to this.  The surprise is… ridiculous, in retrospect. 

His second:  letting the silence drag on too long, paralyzed as he is by shock and—whatever this was.  Adam dimly registers the tension, plunging roots through his ribcage and spreading _out, out, out_. 

His inaction warps it into ruin. 

“Are you really gonna do this?”  

And he can’t process that, either—can’t relate the words to the situation at hand.   But there’s something in his tone that doesn’t sit well with Adam.  His eyes search out Ronan’s, only to discover hurt where moments before there was courage.

The gnarling thing in his chest unfolds to strangle his heart.  “Just,” he trails off.  Desperately trying to shuffle the muddle of his thoughts into something more useful.  Something to get that look off Ronan’s face. 

_It shouldn’t feel like this_.  His boyfriend just told him he loved him.  It shouldn’t feel like the end of the world.  “Just… give me a minute with it, will you?”

A bitter sound escapes Ronan.  “Sure,” he agrees.  And he’s gathering his jacket and shoes.

“Ronan,” Adam tries.  But it gets lost on the way to his throat, and he’s already out the door.

His third mistake:  he expects Ronan to come back.

 

✧  ✧  ✧

 

Adam might have suspected it was the sex.  _Would_ have, were it not for them having it so often.  Because something’s changed between them, and it can’t just be Ronan. 

Or maybe it can.  Adam’s been gone for months.  Worlds could change in far less—he knew that firsthand.  But it doesn’t make _sense_.  Ronan stayed with him those first few nights before Christmas, only dipping out once for Midnight Mass.  Nothing out of place.  No untoward difficulties.  Just _them_.  

And after?  Barring the joyful stretch of time Gansey, Blue, and Henry had spent at the Barns…  Ronan’s acting stranger by the day. 

Adam had counted on the luxury of four solid weeks of blissful cohabitation.  The reality just seems unfair.  Ronan’s _wanting every day with him he can get_ turns into empty beds and lonesome mornings.  

_Where’ve you been_ is a question met unvaryingly with _working_.  Adam’s disappointment stops him from pressing for details.  Because he knows Ronan’s filled the Barns with more traditional animals, started raising fauna and flora alike.  That there are plenty of odd jobs to be done around the property, and Ronan’s hands glad for the work.  But the explanation still wears like a lie.  He’s dreamed himself plenty of helpful contraptions over the last year, after all.  Surely he could spend a few more hours with Adam if he liked. 

How much really needed doing in the winter, anyway?  And at the odd hours he’s keeping?  It doesn’t sit right.  

Adam can’t help but wonder what Ronan considers important enough to squander this much of their time. 

Because their new routine consists of early mornings spent apart.  Of Adam, working four days a week at Boyd’s to earn the rest of his expected contribution for school. 

Of their time together marred too frequently by eerie bouts of disconnection.  Where Ronan doesn’t seem to be with him at all.  And that’s what has his bitter curiosity giving way to concern.  Because something’s _wrong_ , and Ronan’s not telling him what it is.  Adam’s so afraid to make the wrong move—to accidentally push him farther away—that he steadfastly refuses to force the issue.  He pleads not with words, but entreating eyes and tender touches.  _Talk to me, Ronan_ , they say.  Ever trying to draw him back.  Hoping…  _praying_ he realizes Adam’s there for him. 

And of Ronan, vanishing while he works to get a leg up on next semester’s classes.  Of Opal, filling the spaces with her company and curiosity and love.  He knows he’s not imagining the number of reproachful glares she throws Ronan’s way. 

And of heading to bed alone, more than once.  But Ronan returns to him at night.  Freshly showered, with eager lips and hands. 

Adam tries, a handful of times, to keep things chaste.  A half-hearted experiment to see if maybe it wasn’t something to do with the sex, after all.  If Ronan didn’t want this.  If he was only offering himself up to Adam’s immeasurable desire.  If avoiding it altogether might steer things back toward normalcy.  

As transcendent an experience it is to have Ronan spread out before him, Adam would trade it just to keep him beside him.  To regain the simple, familiar tenderness of waking with Ronan in his arms.  Turns out he’s averse to sleeping without some kind of intimacy, though.  Ronan’s quick to pick up the slack—to initiate, if it doesn’t look like Adam’ll get there first.  

And so he loses that battle.  He never wanted to win it. 

Because it’s not like they aren’t nineteen-year-old boys with the sex drives to show for it.  Like Adam didn’t want Ronan more than anything.  Like he didn’t cherish every single moment they had together.  Like they wouldn’t be gone, all too soon.

And so the cycle repeats.  They’re orbiting around one another.  Adam just wishes his gravity were a little stronger.

 

✧  ✧  ✧

  

Adam oversleeps.  He wakes in a bleary sort of panic, annoyed with himself and the alarm.  But most pressingly, his inability to remember if he’d set it the night before.  How could he forget something so rudimentary to his survival?

He doesn’t remember falling asleep, either.  Only that he’d expected Ronan to tromp back up the stairs after he cooled down.  The reality was this:  he hadn’t, and Adam had ten minutes to leave for school. 

The frantic mess of a morning does nothing for his nerves.  His sanity’s slowly fraying at the edges.  It’s hard to concentrate in class when every thought leads back to Ronan.  Adam’s still trying to sort through what happened last night.  Why he hadn’t come back. 

He knows, with a terrible sort of surety, that he hurt Ronan’s feelings.  That he was responsible for the wounded look he’d last seen on his face.  But that doesn’t explain what Ronan thinks happened.  What he might have gathered from Adam’s silence.  And he wants to fix it.

[12:02 PM]  _Are you coming over tonight?_  
[12:04 PM]  _I get off work at 6:30_.  
[12:27 PM]  _Ronan?_

Adam uses Gansey’s cell to text him at lunch.  Perhaps unsurprisingly, Ronan doesn’t answer.  Not then, or at any other point during the school day.  He tries again amidst the chaos of the Aglionby student body flooding from the halls for the weekend. 

[03:15 PM]  _Is this you not talking to me?  
_ [03:16 PM]  _If you’d actually use your phone like a normal person, maybe I could tell._

He types three more halting messages, each riskier than the last. 

_~~Are you going to say anything~~_ _?_  
_~~Why didn’t you come back~~_ _?  
_ _~~I’m sorry~~_ _._

He can’t bring himself to send any of them.  Gansey’s lips purse when Adam surrenders the phone.  He leans against the Pig, eyeing him with mild suspicion.  “Are you and Ronan fighting?”

Adam’s breath clouds between them.  “Honestly, I’m not sure.”  There was every chance that Ronan was simply ignoring his phone for more enjoyable pursuits.  That he wasn’t off licking his wounds and churlishly punishing Adam with his silence.  “The silent treatment’s pretty pointless when you can’t tell if he’s acting any different.” 

Gansey arches a brow.  “That’s valid.  His social skills certainly leave a lot to be desired.  Would you like me to check on him?  He could be at Monmouth.”

Adam shakes his head.  “Nah, I’m gonna try him later from Boyd’s.  If that doesn’t work, I’ll head over after.” 

Ronan doesn’t answer.  So he has no one but himself to blame for Adam showing up at the Barns unannounced. 

The drive gives him ample time to think things over.  Adam’s better sense had folded under the force of Ronan’s declaration, same as with Cabeswater.  How many more grandiose revelations was Ronan saving up?  He’s not sure his brain can handle the shock.  It certainly couldn’t dredge up an appropriate response last night.  

He’d needed time to digest it.  To make sense of what it meant for him.  For _them_.  Time to realize he didn’t need to say it back.  Not yet.  That he doesn’t have to feel worthy of the adoration—only to believe Ronan thought he was. 

He doesn’t have to understand how Ronan could say it…  Could _mean_ it, when Adam’s such a shallow memory of what he once was.  _Magician._   Hadn’t Ronan _needed_ that? 

How could Adam still compare?  The only magic this version of him can claim is the raw, aching aftermath of where it’s been stripped away.  How can he expect to hold onto Ronan without it?  Especially when the miles stretch long between them.  When he might decide Adam isn’t worth it after all. 

_It doesn’t have to matter_ , he reminds himself.  He doesn’t need to be guaranteed a future to enjoy what’s in front of him now.

Ronan answers the door like he’s welcoming his own execution.  He hasn’t slept a wink, if the bruise-dark circles under his eyes are any indication.  He looks defeated.  Wary.  Like he fully believes Adam came here to leave him and he’s waiting for the axe to fall. 

_This shitbag_.  His heart plummets.  Does Ronan really think he’s the kind of asshole to break up with him just because he said _I love you_ before Adam was ready to hear it?  Is that why he stormed out of the apartment last night?  What the hell had his face managed to do to make him think _that_? 

“This doesn’t have to hurt,” he says.  Which, doesn’t even make any sense.  Or sound like any kind of positive affirmation whatsoever.  Panic pushes through Adam’s chest.  He has to make Ronan understand that he’s wrong, that— 

But Ronan understands— _of course he does_ —and drags Adam inside. 

True to his word, he never stops saying it.  He only burns through the spaces where Adam won’t say it back.  Giving him exactly what he needs, in his own brusque, perceptive way.  Relieving the pressure and taming whatever clawing, claustrophobic thing the words bring out in Adam. 

At least until he realizes how badly he wants to speak them in return.

  

✧  ✧  ✧

  

The lonely mornings are hard.  They feed off one another, dredge up ghosts of feelings he’d thought long since overcome.  Of not being good enough.  Of not _being_ enough. 

Then he sees the blatant devotion in Ronan’s eyes and wonders how he ever could have doubted.  He hates that he’s worrying with his own insecurity when something’s so plainly eating at Ronan.  He looks… _depleted_.  Adam doesn’t think he’s looked this drained since the demon attacked his dreams.

“Are you having nightmares again?”  They’re nearly asleep.  He draws the strength to ask from the comfort of Ronan’s back pressed flush against his skin.  He stiffens in Adam’s arms.  The only response he gets is a _no – not like that._   Which isn’t an answer at all.

The nights are their own challenge, filled with bitten-off confessions and passionate desperation.  Every time they come together, his heart cracks open.  Begging him to excavate the insides, to shove them into Ronan’s waiting hands.  _This is yours.  Take it_.  Something about being that close to him makes the idea that Adam’s holding back unbearable. 

But he can’t say it.  The timing is so cliché, so patently opaque, he can’t—  Not then.  Ronan deserves to hear it and actually know he _means_ it. 

Yet every time Adam intends to say it, the words stall on his tongue.  By the time he unsticks his jaw, too many vacant, wanting moments have passed them by.  And Ronan’s moved on to something else, or fallen asleep, or tucked his heart away.  

Another opportunity, ever slipping through his fingers.

 

✧  ✧  ✧

 

The weeks go by too fast.  All too soon, the third week of January hangs over them—a spectre of yearning and reluctance and the cruel face of reality. 

Adam’s bags are packed and loaded up.  He’s sitting in the shitbox, Opal’s on the porch steps glaring at Chainsaw, and the sad little smile on Ronan’s face is breaking his heart.  He’s not ready.  He doesn’t know if he ever will be.

It’s worse than he thought, leaving them behind.  That it’s the third time makes it no less difficult. 

_Come visit_ , he wants to say.  But he doesn’t want to obligate Ronan into the nine hour drive.  And it’s not like Adam isn’t always busy.  Class.  Homework.  Studying.  Work.  How much time could he realistically devote to him?  And, considering his roommate and the lack of privacy in their shared single room… 

Would Ronan even think it was worth it?  Could he bring Opal with him?  Could she be trusted that long on her own?  What was he supposed to do with her, if not?  He didn’t want to inconvenience Ronan _and_ Opal _and_ someone else.

The words freeze on his tongue.

And Ronan’s ducking in through the open door and pressing a kiss to his mouth.  His lips are cold. 

“Give ’em hell, Parrish,” he says.  Then he’s telling Adam he loves him and closing him up in the car.

_This is harder than last time_. 

Probably because he knows there’s no guarantee he’ll see Ronan before spring break.  Months away.  It feels like an eternity.  And not least because Adam never could work out what was troubling him.  Why he looks like he hasn’t slept in the better part of three weeks.

Because if Ronan’s disinclined to talk about something in person, he might as well be physically incapable of sharing it over the phone.  So Adam knows he’s doomed to worry.  That a constant concern for Ronan’s wellbeing will haunt his already bleak feelings about their separation.

He wonders if it’ll ever get any easier.

 


	5. divide

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> cw: brief references to homophobia, self-harm, and night horror -adjacent things  
> 
> 
>  

_Cloudy layers_  
_Where the sky was crystal blue_

 

It’s the distance, he suspects, that will ruin them in the end.  He doesn’t know if he means the miles, or Ronan’s, or his own.  But he’s incontrovertibly sure it will be that.  Because the calls are getting shorter, and Ronan colder.  He’s pulling away, slowly but surely.  And Adam? 

Adam is letting him do it.  He’s _aware_ —in a remote, intellectual sort of way—that his nebulous plans for happiness are listing off-track.  But it’s like he’s watching it happen to another person. 

He should feel _more_ than this, shouldn’t he?  Fury?  Grief?  An overwrought sense of emotional injustice?  Anything beyond this insipid longing, buried too deep inside him to reach. 

This isn’t at all what he wanted. 

He’s surprisingly quick to justify it.

_He’s busy with the farm.  With Opal.  Whatever he’s been doing without you there._

_You can’t expect him to drop everything for you._

_Your schedule is shit.  It’s too hard for him to work around, and it’s starting to show._

_Maybe he’s just finally getting some sleep._

These are the things he tells himself.  That it’s stupid to waste so much time fixating and second-guessing, and that if Ronan really wanted to talk to him, he would.

So he takes his absence in stride, shuffling the vacant hours into assignments and studying and sleep.  He hates the brittle part of himself that’s rationalizing this—that can find any shred of satisfaction in Ronan slipping away from him. 

Like it doesn’t even matter.  Like he doesn’t even care.

Adam thinks he might care too much, actually.  He feels it in the ache of his heart every time he thinks about Ronan.  Every time they say goodbye.  When Ronan flakes on one of their video calls; claiming he’ll message him later.  Every time he doesn’t. 

He knows that words aren’t the best route for navigating the impossible vagaries of Ronan’s innermost thoughts.  But Adam can’t be there to steady him.  No sure hands, tight embraces, or proffered shoulders.  If he says the wrong thing—if Ronan _hears_ the wrong thing in his voice…  He can’t afford an unplanned trip to Virginia to clear the air. 

So they talk, but they don’t.  Not about anything serious.  Not about what’s bothering Ronan, or why he looks so damn exhausted all the time.  Not about the chasm growing between them, or why he’s acting so strange.  Nothing about how much Ronan wants him there.  Or how not a day passes where Adam doesn’t wish Ronan would come to him.

He just takes what he can get, never asking for more.

 

✧  ✧  ✧

 

The idea is an old one, but that doesn’t make it any easier to bring up.  A long history of arduously piecing together his existence has worn a habitual _you shouldn’t_ deep in the roots of Adam’s thoughts.  Sowing doubt and reproach, convincing him he’ll lose something in the process.  That he’s sacrificing his principles.  That he’ll ruin it by speaking too soon. 

Ruin _them_ , somehow. 

May rolls around before he can work up the guts to ask.  It isn’t even a question—not really.  Ronan’s going to say yes.  He knows that.  It makes the most sense for both of them, after all.  One of those rare junctures between indulgence and practicality. 

But when has Adam ever asked for anything like this?  Taken something offered, not earned?

_Love isn’t earned_ , he reminds himself.   _It just is_.  Like everything Ronan’s ever given him. 

But Ronan won’t be the one to suggest it.  Not with that mess of a first _I love you_ still caught between them.  It’s a sore spot his mind likes to revisit when it’s feeling sorry for itself.  To this day, he can’t figure out what happened.  It’s never felt real, that Ronan thought Adam was going to leave him.  That he’d edged their relationship forward and gotten hours of miserable regret in return.  The memory of it hurts _him_.  Was it any wonder Ronan wasn’t eager to repeat the mistake? 

Adam didn’t want to be anyone’s mistake.   And he wouldn’t be.  Not now, not ever.  But he might have accidentally secured the role of _Designated Maker of the Next Move_ along the way.

The Barns is peaceful tonight.  Quiet but for the summer song of the wildlife creeping through the air.  He and Ronan have the house to themselves, as they often do.  Opal, lacking the human predilection for four familiar walls, has taken to staying outdoors.  Digging holes, searching for interesting things to eat; spending more and more time just wandering or messing around inside the barns.  Adam knew Ronan had given her two rules for these activities:  _don’t be seen_ and _careful with the dream shit._  

The first came easy to her, to the frank relief of everyone involved.  She knew how to use the landscape to her advantage, and could be impressively quiet when she put her mind to it.  As for the second…  Well, she did at least seem to recognize the dream things.  Whether she ever heeded Ronan’s advice was another thing entirely.  She hadn’t managed to burn anything down, so he let it slide for the most part.

The two of them are spread wide across the couch, something on Netflix playing in the background.  Adam hasn’t paid it the least bit of attention—too preoccupied with thoughts of the future and Ronan’s head in his lap; the hand at his knee.  His fingers forge idle paths over fabric and skin, content to linger.  Nothing is more important than this:  them, here, now. 

Nights like this were meant for them.  Spending time together that would eventually turn to making out on the couch, down the halls, clumsily up the stairs, and finally in Ronan’s room with a lot less clothes.  Because Fridays were the days he let Ronan talk him into staying the night.  

He doesn’t have another shift for sixteen hours.  His homework can wait.  But if this goes poorly, he’s got plenty of reading and a paper to write back at St. Agnes. 

“So…” he begins eloquently.  There must be some gravity in his tone, because Ronan turns his head.  He shifts, putting his back to the cushions and Adam’s thigh.  The expectant curiosity in his eyes gives Adam the push he needs to continue.  “My lease expires this month.”

Ronan’s face remains impassive.  “You know they’ll keep you on month-to-month,” he says carefully.  “You don’t have to worry about finding somewhere to live for, what?  Three-and-a-half months?  That’s fucking bullshit.”

Adam nods.  He expected that to be the case, but it’s not what he’s aiming for.  That tiny threadbare apartment has lost its claim on his self-worth.  He has so much more now, much finer measures of hard-won success.  Acceptance letters.  Financial aid.  His freedom.  His happiness.  The friends by his side.  And Ronan.  

He’s allowed to want.  He’s allowed to _have_.

“Alternatively…”  His fingertips tease at the spaces between Ronan’s ribs.  “I’ve been spending a lot of my time between here and Monmouth.  Seems I pretty well only go to St. Agnes to go to school, or when I  don’t have time for anything else before a shift.  And, well.  School’s about to leave the equation, so…”  Ronan lifts a brow.

“Seems to me like an awful big waste of money.  Paying all those utilities, that rent—when I’m just about never there.  Seems like that money might best be spent somewhere else.  Seems like there might be plenty of other advantages, too.” 

“What are you saying?”  The words are scarcely more than a whisper. 

Adam curls a hand around his cheek.   Ronan presses into the touch.  “What would you say…  If I wanted to move in _here_ , with you?”

His jaw stiffens under his palm.  Once.  Twice.  _Again_.  Adam thumbs at Ronan’s lips, willing him to respond.

“That you’re not fucking paying me rent,” he says finally.  Voice like the scrape of gravel under tires. 

“Figured I’d help buy the groceries, since we’re both already eating your food.  Makes more sense that way.”  It wasn’t like he had a house payment to make.

“April Fool’s was last month, you know.” 

“I’m well aware,” he counters drily. 

“Pretty presumptuous of you to just _assume_ I’d want your ass living in my house.”

Adam grins.  Why had he ever been nervous about this?  “I mean, I can leave now if you want.”

Ronan darts a hand out—righting himself, tangling their fingers together, and pressing against him in a fluid whirlwind of motion.  “Don’t you fucking dare,” he breathes. 

And Adam closes the distance, all hunger.  A slow, radiant joy eclipses his heart.  They’ve got a whole summer of this to look forward to.   _A whole summer_.

Ronan can’t hide his smile with their foreheads pressed together like they are.  Adam thinks it could warm the sun by degrees.  “You know,” he murmurs.  “You haven’t actually said _yes_.”

“God yes.   _Fuck yes._  Fuck you for even implying the answer might be anything _other than yes_.  Jesus Mary and Joseph.  Of course I want you here, you goddamned idiot.” 

He exhales, breath collecting in the narrow space between them.  “This is your home, Adam.  It’s just been waiting for you to let it be.”

 

✧  ✧  ✧

  

He’s never asked Ronan to visit.  It’s not that he doesn’t miss him.  Christ, if he lets himself think about it too hard, it threatens to take his breath away.  But it feels like too selfish a thing to ask for, with the ever-present deadlines of homework and exams and work looming over him.  It wouldn’t be fair, he thinks, to have Ronan come all that way just to sit in his dorm while he works.  He’d be bored to death.  Insulted, probably, that Adam couldn’t spare him more time. 

Then there was Elliot—an inescapable complication.  And while he _seemed_ open-minded enough about Adam’s dating a boy, the reality was this:  they shared a room.  Ronan could be thorny enough in a good mood.  Annoyed and impatient?  Decidedly difficult to deal with.  Adding the heated backlash Adam was sure to invite by rejecting his advances?  A recipe for bitter disaster. 

He can hear it now…

_No, Ronan, I’m not gonna kiss you._

_Because Elliot’s here, dumbass._

_Yeah it does.  Keep your hands to yourself._

_Seriously.  Quit._

_Knock it off, you idiot._

_No, I will_ not _tell him to ‘fuck off so we can fuck.’_

_‘Why not?’  You sound like a three-year-old._

_Because he’s never done that to me and I’m not looking to piss him off.  Do you have any idea how hard it would be to find another roommate who isn’t a complete dickhead, isn’t loud as hell and constantly partying and parading girls in and out of the room?  A bunch of these guys make your brother look like a saint._

_No, it wouldn’t be_ different _if you were a girl, you asshole.  How can you even—_

_That’s right, Gansey.  Throw money at the problem—that’ll solve it.  I’m not letting you spend that much on a hotel room just to use it for a couple hours.  Don’t much appreciate being made to feel like a prostitute, either.  So, thanks for that._

_Drop it, Ronan.  I still have to finish this paper and I have class tomorrow at eight.  You’re not blowing four hundred dollars for nothing._

_And your point is, what, exactly?_

_Pff.  You think I care what some restaurant we wouldn’t even eat at’s called?  It’s a weird coincidence._  

_Don’t be stupid._  

It wouldn’t go over well, that much was certain.  But Adam had a sneaking suspicion his roommate’s alleged tolerance wouldn’t survive real-life displays of affection in practice—much less anything vaguely implying sexual intimacy. 

Which would have been easier to deal with if Elliot were some kind of jackass.  He’s not, though.  And he’s never been inconsiderate about bringing girls to their room and making Adam uncomfortable, so he wouldn’t feel right getting handsy (or mouthy, or other part- _y_ ) with Ronan there.  He knows he could warn him, be an asshole about it and kick him out of the room…  But he’s reluctant to jeopardize how well they’ve gotten along so far.

Most of the other boys had a storied history with money and not more than a passing one with the word _no._  Haughty, overblown and unwilling to bend—it was Aglionby all over again.  With a greater sense of entitlement, if that were even possible.  He’s lucky to have landed another scholarship student from the south for a roommate.  Elliot is friendly, down-to-earth, respectful of Adam’s privacy, and dedicated to his own studies.  They’ve already talked about sticking together in the fall.

He knows he can’t avoid it forever.  They can’t carry on like this, never seeing one another, always working around Adam’s breaks.  Maybe imaginary argument Ronan was right after all.  He hates to even consider it, but maybe there _was_ an ounce of truth in thinking this might be a little easier if he were dating a girl.  Then he’d only need to worry about his roommate being opposed to PDA.  Not stuck in this awkward position of sussing out any egregious homophobia before it could become an issue.  If Ronan came, Adam didn’t want him leaving in handcuffs. 

But he doesn’t know how to fix it.  So he watches the circles under Ronan’s eyes darken through the grainy filter of a camera lens.  Wishing he could be with him.  Could hold him.  Could sleep beside him.  Could muster the bravery to ask him what the hell is wrong. 

If Ronan would just bring it up…  If he’d take his usual _fuck the consequences_ attitude on the road with him and come to Massachusetts…  Adam knew the presence of Ronan, bodily on his doorstep, would go a long way toward changing his priorities.  Obligations and boyfriend—how much easier would the choice be to make, if the one he actually _wanted_ was here with him? 

But he never does.  Doesn’t bring it up.  Doesn’t come.  And Adam knows enough not to expect that to change now.  Not when things are so strained between them.  When he can feel them falling to dust in his hands.

So he does the only thing he can.  Curls up under a soft blanket that smells of Ronan, wraps a hand around his wrist, and tries to convince himself that everything will be okay.

And the world keeps spinning on.

 

✧  ✧  ✧

  

It isn’t long before the gifts start to arrive.  And if Adam had any lingering doubts as to who would inflict such a haphazard wrap job on a package, the _YOUR FAVORITE MOTHERFUCKER_ return address erases them.  They come frequently enough, contents veering from thoughtful to ridiculous to sweetly fanciful.

Like a dark hoodie he’s seen draped around Ronan countless times.  It’s one of the only mementos that shows up with an explanation.   _This one’s for me, Parrish.  I expect it back at Thanksgiving._  Adam takes special care to wear it the nights they video chat.  Ronan’s pleased smirk is well worth the effort. 

And a plush grey blanket Adam sleeps with every night.  It radiates a preternatural heat when he needs it, a soft feeling of comfort when he doesn’t.  Arguably the best thing about it is how strongly it smells of Ronan.  That the scent never diminishes with use.  Adam doesn’t think he has enough arrogance in their relationship to have done it on purpose—but it makes an excellent bonus all the same. 

He’s awful at pinpointing the traps.  They wait to be handled first, so Adam won’t realize his error until one starts spouting the murder squash song with cheerful purpose.  He quarantines the offenders to a box underneath his bed.  And with each new addition, texts Ronan a picture of his middle finger in front of the growing collection.

His favorite gift is a pair of earbuds that arrives near the middle of the semester.  They come packed in a case with a strange texture and an ominous note:  _Power corrupts.  Don’t abuse me, shitlord._   Adam has no idea what that’s supposed to mean, but he isn’t about to ask Ronan.  Nor will he let a perfectly good pair of high-quality headphones go to waste. 

At first, he suspects it’s a reference to the unsubtle magic of them.  Ever since that night with his father, Adam’s had a love-hate relationship with music.  Headphones make it worse, make it abundantly clear he’s only hearing half of what he’s meant to.  It’s destroyed his favorite songs for him, leaving obvious, wanting blanks in everything.  Mirroring how Adam still felt—like there’s a hole inside him that would never leave.

He stares at the left earbud for a long moment, contemplating.  Deciding, finally, to put it in.  For balance, if nothing else.  It’s the right decision.  When he hits play…  _Jesus Christ._  It’s like he can hear again, his left ear good for more than just a slab of dead sensation.  Like when Cabeswater would whisper in that ear, it doesn’t feel quite natural.  But God, does it feel _right_. 

He’s immersed in the symphony of sound around him and, as ever, in awe.  Ronan is so damn thoughtful; so full of love and knowing.  The magic of Ronan—that he exists, that he’s capable of such wonders, that he’s chosen Adam, that he knows him _so goddamn well_ —makes Adam feel closer to whole than he has in a long, long time. 

Adam discovers the unfortunate truth of the warning three nights later.  He’s trying to study, using the music to keep himself awake.  But exhaustion’s been gnawing at him too long; he’s fighting to keep his eyes open.  And no sooner does fatigue win the battle, than do the headphones blare the murder squash song at him.  Horrified, he tears them from his ears. 

How utterly like Ronan, to take something so wondrous and corrupt it with an indisputable reminder that he is and always will be a complete shitbag about _everything_.  A smile flickers at the corner of Adam’s mouth.  He reaches for them again. 

Later that week, he learns their final secret.  The third time Adam nearly falls asleep at his desk, Ronan’s low voice comes through the wires.  “I gave you two chances, asshole.  Stop fighting it and go the fuck to bed already.”

The next morning, Adam uses Elliot’s printer to fashion a photograph of the headphones loosely wrapped around his middle finger.  He mails it to _MY FAVORITE ASSHOLE._

 

✧  ✧  ✧

  

Adam’s knee is a hard pressure against his temple.  He doesn’t know if the discomfort’s grounding him or making it easier to get lost.  He’s wedged into a chair, absently thumbing a slip of paper between his fingers.  Gaze focused a million miles away.  He doesn’t need to see the words to remember them.

It’s the feeling that matters now.  The fine texture of the paper.  The memory.  That aching, irrational thing inside him, whispering—telling him that if he’d only try a little harder, maybe…  Maybe he could convince the ink to give up those feelings.  Give him back that contentment and sure sense of rightness.  He’d capture them if he could.  Keep them safer this time. 

The poem is one of the nicer ones.  A sweet, romantic sentiment about no sum of kisses ever being enough.  Another Catullus.  It reminds Adam of the one Ronan sent before winter break.  How those first few days together were full of such senseless happiness, he didn’t know what to do with it.  How much he misses Ronan now. 

“Whatever happened to that, anyway?” 

It takes him too long to string the words together.  Even when he does, he fails to assign a plausible meaning to them.  “Hmm?” 

Elliot’s unfazed by his inarticulate response.  “Your boyfriend.  He’s not sending you things anymore.” 

_Right_.  Adam had never wanted to hide the packages.  And because he never tried, they eventually demanded explanation.  But the truth—that they contained the dreamt machinations of his magical boyfriend’s inner mind—could not have more clearly not been an option. 

So he lied.  When his friends asked about it, he said that Ronan had a lot of time and money at his disposal.  That he liked to spend it looking for the weirdest, most improbable shit he could find.  All to make Adam smile.  

It was close enough to the truth. 

And the promise of a vast budget did an admirable job of explaining away the quirks.  One could buy almost anything if enough cash were offered in trade.  Why assume magic with a much more obvious solution laid neatly before you? 

“Why’d he stop?”

Something inside him curdles at the question.  Elliot isn’t being purposely obtuse.  He knows they’re still together.  Knows they still talk.  Adam likes to think he’d have been a little more tactful about it if he suspected they’d broken up.  He can’t have guessed how visceral a reaction it would produce in Adam all the same. 

Because he doesn’t know the answer, but he _misses it_.  Misses the tangible evidence that Ronan was always thinking about him.  The thoughtful things he’d obviously contemplated.  The ridiculous ones that made him laugh the way only Ronan could.  The charming things that made him smile. 

The way they all reminded him of the magic in the world. 

He could feel Ronan in them.  And he didn’t think it was solely in the abstract sense.  Though he didn’t know how else he could have, with his magic long gone. 

Then again…  Hadn’t Ronan always had a little extra to give? 

The tokens of affection were so important to Adam.  Their absence—insurmountable evidence that Ronan really _was_ pulling away—is keenly felt.  He isn’t overreacting, overanalyzing, overcomplicating.  It’s real.

He can’t come up with an explanation.  Can’t find an answer that fits.  It all just boils down to the same immutable conclusion:

_It hurts._

 

✧  ✧  ✧

  

“Make it stop.”

Adam’s eyes open to darkness and— something too loud; something too bright.  He forces his sleep-fogged thoughts through the slow sieve of his senses.  Trying to remember where he is.  Why that sound is so familiar, if not the conditions he’s hearing it under.  Why his nightstand is glowing. 

He blinks away the sting.  A portrait of Ronan, head tilted ravishingly toward the sun, stares back at him.

His heart spasms for a few weightless, terrifying seconds — just long enough to put together the time and the circumstance and a handful of dreadful possibilities — then slams back into rhythm with a vengeance.

And he can’t move fast enough, trapped in a stop-motion picture of alarm.  

_scrambling from the bed_

_yanking the blanket around his shoulders_

_silencing the ringer_

_snatching his keys_

_whispering an apology to his roommate_

The phone’s still buzzing in his hand.  Adam’s fingers are trembling, a fact dimly registered in the eternity it takes him to hit _ACCEPT_.

“Ronan?”  The door clicks to behind him, overloud in the 3:47 AM silence.  “What is it?  What’s wrong?”

Because he can’t keep deluding himself, can he?  Not anymore.  Ronan’s calling him so late, it’s looped right back around to _early_. 

He doesn’t do this.  Especially not when Adam has class in a few hours.

Ronan doesn’t answer.  The sound of his labored breathing is the only indication he’s even there.  Is he hurt?  Angry?  Is he… _crying?_  Ice scores a path down Adam’s spine.  “ _Ronan?”_  

He ducks into the common area at the end of the hall, taking care to pull the door closed.  It’s snowing outside; the courtyard as empty as he’s ever seen it.  When Ronan finally speaks, his words are steeped in misery.  “I don’t think I can do this.”

And Adam is glad there’s a chair nearby, because his legs abruptly fail him.  His pulse throbs in his ears.  He can’t think.  He can’t see straight.  Everything is a white-hot blur of pain and panic and _what?_  

“I’m so tired,” he hears Ronan say.  And he sounds it.  Sounds like he’s ridden his despair as far as it will take him.   _Tired of what, Ronan?_

_This_ , scoffs the cruel voice inside him.   _He’s tired of this_.

No.  Adam refuses to believe that.  There has to be another reason.  _Any_ other reason.  Ronan is all in, all-or-nothing.  He can’t mean _that_.

_But you saw this coming, didn’t you?  Remember?  You knew you wouldn’t be able to hold onto him._  

There’s a ragged hole where his heart used to be.  The rest of him feels like it’s been shoved six feet underground.

God.  _God._   Was he really going to do this?  How could—  Was Ronan just… tired of trying?  Just like that?  No discussion.  No warning.  No—

_Hope._

Unbidden, his mind dredges up a memory from two years before:  Ronan, lying pale and drawn on a hospital bed.  The bandages wrapped up to his elbows.  The way Adam felt when he saw him. 

He hadn’t understood his connection with Ronan back then.  Maybe they didn’t even have one.  But they were friends, and Adam had never lost a friend before.  Had never had any real friends to lose.  All he’d been able to think was how, if Noah hadn’t found Ronan when he did, Adam never would have seen him again.  And he remembers how helpless that made him feel.  How sick.

_Fuck._ That was so long ago.  The image of Niall’s brutalized corpse much fresher in Ronan’s mind.

Opal had spoken to Adam about it, once.  It’d been a sweltering day in the middle of summer—Ronan gone visiting his brothers and Opal’s frustration running high.  She’d snapped at Adam, but it wasn’t him she was annoyed with.  It was the world.  Too many rules, she’d huffed, and declared them unfair and furthermore un _fun_.  He’d patiently asked what the dreams had been like instead, because he still had a hard time imagining it. 

And she told him.  Talked about the limitless wonders and fantastical unrealities.  But also how horrible Ronan’s dreams were back then.  Every one of them nightmares.  How many literally tore him apart, despite her best efforts to guide him from harm.  The misery and self-hatred had been so twisted up inside him that his dreams gave them form.  Fashioned them into monsters.  Gave them life, so that they might take his away.  Something a part of Ronan had unmistakably wanted—wanted badly enough to drag back to reality.

But he’d promised that wouldn’t happen again.  Promised Gansey.  Promised him. 

And he was doing better.  So much better.  Coping with the demons that haunted him.  Not turning to alcohol every time he felt too much.  Not _needing_ to.  He was happy, for the most part.  And he was dealing with the unhappy bits in much healthier ways. 

_Can you really be sure, though?_   Flashes of the dark circles beneath his eyes.  _You know something’s going on_.  Of Ronan drifting away right in front of him.  _It could just as easily be that._   His hollow stare after Aurora.  _Depression doesn’t just disappear._

The possibilities were endless, but so few of them good.

God, was this how it was going to be?  Was Adam doomed to spend the rest of his life worrying about Ronan?  Fearing that something might happen to him when he wasn’t there?  When he couldn’t be.  That he wouldn’t be able to do enough.  That he couldn’t save him.  That he would lose him. 

Adam’s lungs retreat from the possibility.  His skin feels too tight.  He can’t—  He’s going to suffocate to death right here in this chair in the middle of this dorm.  Five hundred fifty miles from where he needs to be.  He’ll never get to tell Ronan he—

“It won’t…” he rasps.  Ronan hasn’t said another word, and he has to _try_.  He doesn’t know what he’s trying to save him from—save _them_ from—but he has to try.  “It won’t be like this forever.”

His breath is all shards of glass wrapped in barbed wire.  “It’ll get better.”  _It has to_.  “We just need to make it through this, okay?” 

_And then what?_   that vicious voice mocks.

And then have to do it all over again, if he goes to grad school?  Does he really believe he can lock down a job in his field close enough to stay?  Would Ronan move for him?  Would Adam even be able to ask?  Ask him to leave his home—the only future he’s ever once shown to want for himself?  Was he selfish enough to encourage that kind of sacrifice? 

“Just…”  His heart thuds, dull in his chest.  What can he _say?_  What can Adam say that this raw, terrifying version of Ronan will listen to?  “Don’t make any decisions tonight.” 

“Don’t do anything you’ll regret come light of day.  I know it might seem like the right thing now, but—”  He scrubs a rough hand through his hair.   _Think, Adam._

“You haven’t been sleeping, right?  I can see it in your face when you call.  You—  Just sleep on it, okay?  You’ll…”  He takes a chance.  “You’ll feel different when you can look at this all with a fresh mind.”

Ronan blows out a breath, jagged and unsteady.  “It’s just.  It’s just so fucking hard, Parrish.” 

“I’m sorry,” he whispers.  Adam crushes the phone against his shoulder; curls a hand around the bracelet at his wrist.  The flood of emotion that rushes over him brings half-formed tears to his eyes.  “I’m here.” 

Ronan says nothing else, though Adam can hear his breath evening out as the quiet moments stretch on.  They sit that way for a good chunk of them.  Ronan – silent.  Adam – thoughts racing, possibilities spinning out before him, hope waging a war against the insidious voice of despair inside him.

“Are you okay?” he asks at length.  “Do you need me to stay on the phone with you?  I will if you want me to.  If not, ’m gonna head back to my room.  I’ve got class in three hours.”

“ _Fuck_.”  He can picture Ronan pinching the bridge of his nose, brow crinkled.  How Adam wishes he could be heading back to a bed with him in it.  “Yeah, no, of course.  I never should have called.  Don’t know what the shithell I was thinking.  Go to sleep, Parrish.”  And he’s gone.

He frowns at his phone.  A small, petty part of him recognizes that this is the first time Ronan’s hung up without telling Adam he loves him.  Hope loses ground. 

Heart lodged firmly in his throat, Adam resigns himself to a miserable, sleepless three hours.  But a text buzzes in as he’s making his way out of the common room. 

_love u sry fr fucking tmrw for u_  

The knot in his chest loosens.  He still hates that Ronan feels obligated to apologize for needing him, though.  He never asks Adam for anything. 

_Wish you’d stop apologizing for no reason._  
_Doesn’t look good on you.  
_ _I’m here for you, Ronan._

_ik but u have more impt shit to deal w than my bullshit_

_You’re important to me, idiot._

_asshole  
_ _< 3_

And when Ronan doesn’t call him that night, Adam picks up the phone and does it himself.  

Ronan never brings it up again.  And Adam, not wanting to call back whatever trauma got him to that point in the first place, doesn’t either.  He doesn’t push.  He lets Ronan take what he needs, and lets that be the end of it.  

And so it becomes another thing they don’t talk about.  Another wanting silence.  Another corrosive worry.  Just another thing he hopes isn’t tearing them apart.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In some ways I wish I'd gotten this out before the short story, because now it looks like I'm lifting some of things I'd already had planned out. But on the other hand, it's good to have been able to give Opal some better characterization ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯ 


	6. desiderium

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *shows up four months late with starbucks*   a) thank you for coming back and b) don’t worry, I’m mad at me for taking this long too   
> 
> 
> non-linear narrative hijinks ahead   
>  [ eta: fixed some structural things so this should be much more cohesive than the first 10 hours it was up ;) ]   
>    
> 

desiderium — (n.) an ardent desire or longing, especially for something once had

 

_Can we recover_  
_Can we get over this_  
_Are we too deep in the night to see the day_

 

There’s no shortcut to recovery, as each of them learns in time.  Moving past the devastation wrought by the demon takes weeks… _months_ of painstaking adjustment.  A handful of visits to Fox Way map what’s left of Adam’s hope.  Hungry and adrift, he’s desperate to regain what he’s lost. 

Persephone’s words ache through his bones.  _Being the Magician isn’t about being powerful when you have things and useless when you don’t._   Time may have worn the edges off her absence, but not her insight.  If there was even a chance, didn’t he owe it to himself to try?

_You were different before_ , she’d said.  But he can’t make anything magical now.  He can’t so much as find the threads, let alone _use_ them. 

A distant clatter wends its way through his thoughts.  One blink, and the world slips away.  He can’t breathe, he can’t breathe, _he can’t_ —  

The scene in front of him isn’t as he remembers it.  His chest is heaving.  The scrying bowl lies several feet to his left, turned up on its rim.  

Shame spills through Adam, dark as the juice staining the ground.  He told himself he wouldn’t do this again.  That he was better than this.  

_You are not your anger._  

Maura tuts.  “Have you considered that you might need to let go of your frustration?  It’s no wonder the magic can’t find its way, when you’re giving it such a hard one to go.”

He laughs once, the sound harsh and bitter.  “You think I wasn’t frustrated _before?”_

“I didn’t say that.”  Maura leans back, pulling a knee to her chest.  “But that forest was using you as a conduit, before.  It had enough power to do the heavy lifting.  Your own magic, it’s more fragile.  Less practiced.  Think…”  She bites her lip, considering.  “Think of it like a sapling.  It needs all the help it can get to grow, and your negative energy is strangling it at the roots.  You’re putting a barrier between it and you that it can’t overcome.”

Adam is, all at once, exhausted.  He’s sick of pretending.  Tired of the disappointment.  Why should he keep wasting his time, Maura’s time, what hope he had left—knowing nothing was going to change?  “Why don’t you just say it?”

“Say what, Adam?” 

“That I’m ruined.  I’m not getting it back.  I’ll never be more than this…”  His fists clench, nails marring the surface of his palms.  “This _half_ -thing I am now.” 

Maura’s forehead creases.  She eyes him carefully, searching.  “Have you spoken to Ronan about any of this?” 

“No,” he says shortly.  “And I don’t plan on it.” 

“Why not?”  She cuts a hand through the air.  “Don’t give me that nonsense about not wanting the help.  You’re here.  You’ve learned it’s okay to ask; you know you’re not any less for it.  And you’ve _been there_ for that boy,” she stresses like it’s some great accomplishment.  “Do you honestly think he wouldn’t do the same for you?” 

The opposite, more like.  “Because I’m not that selfish.  His mother’s _dead_.  He’s got more than enough to deal with without my petty bullshit on top of it.”

The furrow deepens.  Maura’s mouth parts again, but he’s quick to cut her off.  “It won’t make any difference.  Cabeswater’s gone.  It’s done.  Gansey’s alive.  Everyone’s okay.  I just need to learn to live with this.” 

Her expression turns to pity, then.  Adam’s spine stiffens.  Humiliation sits hot like bile in his throat.  His mind’s made up:  he’s not coming back.  Not for this.

For weeks now, he’s been setting himself up for disappointment.  Hiding from Ronan.  Wasting everyone’s time.  And what did he have to show for it?  _Nothing._  

Adam didn’t have time for this.  He needed to just face the truth and move on.  Live his life.  

He couldn’t be what Persephone wanted.  He couldn’t take back what wasn’t his to begin with.  

Borrowed power.  Borrowed purpose.  Maybe it was always going to end this way. 

“You’re only gonna make this harder on yourself, you know.” 

“I can handle it,” he snaps, rising to his feet.  What had he been doing this entire time, if not making things harder on himself?

“And on him,” she mutters.  But he’s already walking away.

 

✧  ✧  ✧

  

“How’s Opal been?”  The leaves and sticks and feathers and curious rocks that snuck their way into his collection of gifted dreams were important to Adam, too.  Ronan’s not the only one he misses with every fiber of his being. 

“Hah.” 

“That bad, huh?” 

“She gets bored,” he drawls.

“I’d say that’s pretty normal.  She’s part kid, after all.  And _you._ ” 

Ronan snorts at that.  “If by _kid_ you mean ‘indiscriminate eating machine with no conscience to speak of’ …then sure, she’s a weird-ass goat with a taste for trash.  But no way in any kind of hell is she _normal_ , Parrish.  Normal doesn’t eat rabbits on the porch and hide the bones in the bushes.”

“Oh.”  Adam pictures Opal grinning red around a hare’s foot and shudders.  “God.” 

“ _Yeeeeah_.  Guess I shouldn’t have gotten so pissed about the mice?  Her answer _would_ be to go after something bigger.  Creepy little shit.  Can’t just enjoy a nice day outside without savaging the fucking wildlife.”  

Ronan huffs.  “I don’t know if she’s ever gonna be happy here, Adam.  She couldn’t give half a fuck about passing for human.  And even if she did…”  He doesn’t finish, just bangs around in frustration and expects Adam to understand.  

He does.  She has hooves, speaks fluent Latin, doesn’t age, and swears like a sailor.  She wasn’t a child.  And they couldn’t keep dressing her up as one.

“Half the fucking time I think she regrets ever leaving my head.  She gets so pissed about the things she can’t do here.  And she’s not doing better.  She’s just getting restless.” 

A silence settles over them, but it’s one that wants to be broken.  Adam waits. 

And when the words come, they’re reluctant.  Like part of Ronan thinks he might be better off not to hear them.  “It’s gotten worse.  You know, now that it’s just me.  I don’t interest her like you do.  Not anymore.”

Guilt tangles through his chest.  He misses Opal, too.  _Of course he does_.  But hearing Ronan say he’s not enough… 

“She disappears for days at a time, and I—  I worry sometimes.  How could I goddamned not?  Like, I _know_ she’s not really a kid.  In my head, I know that.  But fuck if that doesn’t mean I don’t feel responsible for her.  I brought her here.” 

“If you hadn’t,” Adam reasons, “she’d be gone.”  The demon had ravaged Ronan’s dreams.  He saw the destruction it unleashed on Cabeswater.  Opal never would have survived if he’d left her there. 

“Yeah.”  But that didn’t mean she was satisfied with the life she’d been given.  It hurts Adam to think about.  He wondered, sometimes, if Ronan felt the same way. 

If you could dream anything, what use would you have for the world? 

How could anything compare to what went on inside his head?  Was Ronan always bored?  Disappointed to be awake?  Was the insomnia just an excuse to keep from losing himself?  Was it a constant temptation?

Adam wondered, too, if he ever helped—or if he was just another flat, colorless fixture of a comparatively uninteresting reality.  

Which is why, the night Ronan asks if he’s found anyone at college, he’s sure he slipped into an alternate dimension on his way back from class. 

Like that was an actual possibility.  Like he could ever be replaced.  Ronan’s joking.  He has to be. 

Adam _thinks_ he is.  Hopes with the heart that’s dropped straight through the floor he is, but Ronan’s voice is serious as ever.  Adam pretends he can’t hear it.  He doesn’t want to put too much stock in the other possibility:  That Ronan might think that’s going to happen.  That maybe he _wants_ it to. 

“Pretty sure I’m already taken by some asshole who doesn’t know what’s appropriate to joke about.” 

“Just waiting for you to realize you’re sick of me,” he says.  Like _Adam_ is the one distancing himself from _Ronan_.  Like he isn’t desperate to get him back.

“Don’t hold your breath.”

 

✧  ✧  ✧

  

Something calls to Adam in his dreams.  Images he can’t explain.  Odd feelings.  Hints of figures looming in the shadows…  All in fits and spurts, erratic and unpredictable.  

So when the impressions start bleeding through to reality, _surprised_ isn’t the word for it.  He’s damaged.  He knows it.  Adam reckons no one was meant to discover magic like he had, only to have it ripped away in the end. 

Some days he wonders if he isn’t going mad.  His only consolation is that he knows it’s all in his head.  Nothing’s crawling after him in the streets.  The shadowy creature in the corner of the lecture hall isn’t really there.  And the scattered flashes of what feel like someone else’s memories are just his brain going haywire.

There’s no ley line thrumming beneath him.  His mind’s trading truth for comfort, like it did in Henrietta. 

Just because he _wants_ to feel it, doesn’t mean it’s there.  Not for him.  Not anymore.  He can’t trust his senses with a host of wayward neurons stumbling through the bygone paths forged by Cabeswater.  

Because it can’t mean anything good. 

He can’t feel what he used to.  Can’t call it up on command.  And he’s long since written off any attempt at scrying as an exercise in abject self-flagellation. 

On his worst days, Adam wonders if maybe his father didn’t manage to knock loose something more important than half his hearing. 

_It isn’t real.  It isn’t—_  
_You’ve got to stop doing this to yourself._  
_It can’t hurt you._  
_It isn’t what you think._  
_Just open your eyes and breathe._  
_Just close—_  
_Breathe._  
_Breathe.  
_ _B r e a t h e._

These are the things he tells himself, a broken record of self-assurances and pragmatic doubt.  He says them until he can’t say them anymore.  

Then reality rearranges itself to spite him.

  

✧  ✧  ✧

 

It’s not that Adam doesn’t want to go back to Virginia.  He does.  He definitely does.  But there’s a dark cloud of uncertainty trailing him down the interstate.  Because he doesn’t know what to expect — doesn’t know if he’s heading back to _Ronan_ , or the unfathomable paradox he’s dealt with on the phone. 

They have a week together.  One week for Adam to figure out what the hell’s going on. 

Is he supposed to act like nothing’s wrong?  Ignore the tension and hope for the best?  The last thing he wants to do is start a fight his first night home.  Not when they have so little time. 

But Ronan just hustles him inside with a grin and a _wash up, Parrish_.  A mouthwatering spread greets him in the dining room.  And if they happen to eat with their feet tangled underneath the table, there’s no one to say anything about it.  

Opal joins them, eager to spend time with Adam even at the cost of coming inside.  She’s still damp from a hose bath, and much less interested in the dinner than the silverware. 

Ronan’s too distracted to stop her in time—though he takes plenty to swear over the ruined fork afterwards.  Adam can’t keep a straight face.  Unimpressed by the scolding, Opal flounces her way outside in a huff. 

And after dinner comes _stay the fuck away from those dishes_ and wet towel fights and heated kisses against the kitchen counter.  But Opal’s too excited to leave them alone for long.  

She drags them out of the house and into a fierce game of tag that ends with the three of them breathless and grass-stained and satisfyingly winded as the sky turns orange above them.

He’s missed this.  More than anything.

Adam allows himself a moment to just take it all in.  Chainsaw tucked comfortably against his shoulder, he wanders over to one of the long fences mapping the property.  The fading light reveals a number of once-empty fields — now cultivated and sown.

He’s impressed.  Ronan’s been busy.

He comes up beside him, preening and clearly pleased with the attention.  “We’ll have plenty of fresh shit to eat this summer.” 

A soft smile settles on Adam’s lips.  Hearing him plan for their future together so easily is a soothing balm to his soul.  He was an idiot to think he didn’t want one.  Ronan loves him.

And he’s eager to show it.  The instant the door locks behind them, Ronan’s mouthing at his neck, hands impatiently rucking up his shirt.  Adam must be drunk on happiness, taking utter leave of his senses.  “And you call _me_ thirsty,” he laughs.  

The words escape his mouth before he can grasp what the hell he just signed himself up for.  Because it’s not like he has any room to talk.  And Ronan’s smirk is positively reptilian.  It’s fortunate, really, that Opal leaves them the house to themselves. 

Ronan oversleeps his responsibilities by a magnitude of hours.  Adam feels like he’s won… something.  

Their new routine is everything he ever could have asked for:  Ronan cooking breakfast.  Opal badgering them about their plans for the day.  Adam helping with the chores—selfish and helpful by turns.  (The work goes faster with two people, and he would rather spend the hours together than apart.) 

Then comes the recklessness of their afternoons.  Indulging in foolhardy invented pastimes and windows-down winding drives.  They stumble into the house later with bruises, windblown faces, drenched in water or covered in mud — but always, invariably, grinning from ear to ear. 

Adam takes the evenings to work on his assignments, installing himself in the kitchen while Ronan’s busy cooking and working around him when he’s sprawled against Adam on the couch.  And at night, they can’t get enough of each other.  

It’s like they’re making up for lost time, coming together in a desperate brand of coupling borne of long absence.  And when they fall, spent and sated into sleep, it’s pressed close like neither ever plans to leave.  All too aware how fast the days will pass them by. 

But everything seems back to normal.  Ronan may look tired, but he’s happy and he’s present.  Smiling and joking and carrying on as if the last few months had never happened.  Adam thinks it’s _this_.  

This is the answer.  It’s the distance that’s the problem.  When they’re together, things are good again.  Like they’d never been anything else. 

_Summer_ , he thinks.  _We’ll have summer_.

The call comes the week after he leaves the Barns.  Of course it does.  The universe is a fickle bastard, especially where Adam Parrish is concerned.  And this just proves it.

Because it’s an internship offer.  A _good_ one.  With a well-known company in his field.  It’ll look great on his resume.  On his grad school applications.

A blessing in every way but one.

 

✧  ✧  ✧

  

“That goat you like got up on the roof today.” 

As conversation starters go, it’s a _choice_.  Adam has to stop and think for a moment.  “Which one, Diesel?”  She was a sturdy little thing, black everywhere except the face.  She’d taken to Adam immediately, and him to her.  

“Yep,” Ronan agrees, sounding proud.

“…how, exactly?  And which roof?” 

“Fuck if I know.  The long barn.  I’d say Opal had something to do with it, if I had to guess.  She looked _awfully_ damn pleased about it when she pointed her out.” 

Adam chuckles.  He hopes the sound isn’t as choked as his throat feels.  This is going to be harder than he thought.  There’s a hole in his gut, growing larger by the moment. 

“So I drag a ladder over and get up there and this little fucker just… darts out of my reach every time I get close to her.  Every.  Single.  Time.  She just keeps running to the opposite side of the roof.  Doesn’t matter what I do.  And of course, Opal’s down there laughing the entire goddamn time.” 

“Naturally.” 

“So I finally get her cornered, right?  And this bitch just turns around, jumps down, and trots off like nothing ever happened.  That goat is a shitbag.”

“Did you dream this one?  I can’t remember.”  Adam always suspected Ronan had, not least because her white markings bore suspicious resemblance to a skull.

“Nah.  She’s a natural-born hellion.  Why?” 

He can’t keep the smile out of his voice.  “Oh, just thinking it would’ve made a lot of sense if you had.  Most of your dreams end up with your personality.” 

“Fuck you, shit waffle,” replies Ronan good-naturedly.  “Just remember:  you’re the dipfuck that actually prefers our company.”  Adam had to give him that.  He did love them all. 

“What else you been up to?  Or have you adopted goat wrangler as a new profession?”

“Hah.  After that ungodly shitshow?  Man, I needed to burn off some energy before I burned _something._ ” 

“Well, I know you’re not calling me from jail, so I can only assume you didn’t get caught.” 

“Asshole.  For your information, I went to the back field and drove around until the BMW got stuck in the mud.”

“Did you get it out?”

“What do you take me for, an amateur?” 

Adam hums.  “Bit of a dumbass, if I’m being honest.” 

“Hey,” says Ronan, no heat in his tone.  “Just because you go to that fancy-ass school doesn’t mean—”

“Ronan,” he interrupts.  He doesn’t want to have this conversation.  But the longer he waits, the guiltier he feels.  “We need to talk.” 

Hesitation digs a trench around the words.  Neither of them quite know how to cross it. 

“Thought that was what we were doing, Parrish,” Ronan hedges eventually. 

“I…”  Adam clears his throat, starts again.  “I got some news yesterday.” 

“Okay?”  

And he tells him about the internship. 

“ _Okay?_ ” he repeats, unruffled.  “Why do you sound like someone pissed on your parade, then?  That sounds like exactly the kind of thing you’d like.”

“I think it might be, but…” 

“Jesus fuck, Adam.  Spit it out.”

“It’s in Boston,” he finishes, and the dread seeps from that hole in his stomach directly into his bones. 

Silence falls over them like a blanket, smothering and uncomfortable.  “Oh,” he says finally.  

Adam’s mouth opens and closes as he fishes for something to say.  But he doesn’t know what Ronan wants to hear.  

“Didn’t know you were applying there.”  And despite his efforts, the hurt in his tone rings clear. 

“I wasn’t,” Adam confirms.  “I _didn’t_.  That’s why I didn’t tell you yesterday.  I was trying to figure out…”  He finds it difficult, suddenly, to swallow.  Ronan hasn’t said another word.  

Adam wonders where he is, what he’s doing, what he’s thinking.  “My seminar professor put me up for it.  Apparently they’re allowed to ‘nominate students who they feel show exceptional promise.’”

“Sounds like you, alright,” he murmurs.  “How long?”

He doesn’t understand the question.  Adam already told him _yesterday_.  He couldn’t stand to keep it quiet any longer.  “Huh?” 

“How long does it last?”  His voice sounds odd. 

“Oh.  Twelve weeks.” 

He can hear Ronan doing the calculations in his head.  Three weeks.  That’s all they would have together.  

Adam still doesn’t know what to say.  _Tell me not to take it_ , he thinks.  But of course, that’s not Ronan.  

He doesn’t.  He just makes an excuse to get off the phone, and they wind up not talking about it at all.

  

✧  ✧  ✧

 

It happens without preamble.  Adam doesn’t even realize he’s dreaming at first.  He just feels disoriented.  Weightless.  Strange.  And oddly out of place.  

He blinks, like that might make a difference in what he’s seeing.  Touches a finger to the corner of his open eye when it doesn’t.  It’s worse than seeing things that aren’t there.  This is…

_Nothing_.  There’s _nothing_.  Fragile seconds pass in weighted terror.

He _can’t_ be blind.  _God_.  He’s already half-deaf, stripped of power, and probably losing his mind.  He can’t afford to lose his sight, too.  _What else is left?_

So strong is his panic that he nearly misses the ancient force rippling beneath him.  He’s close to where Cabeswater used to be, it tells him.  But that’s not possible. 

_He can’t feel the line anymore_.  What he _can_ feel is himself, lying in his bed at Cambridge. 

It doesn’t make a damn bit of sense.  Everything about this is impossible.  The way his perception’s straddling two different realities.  How it feels like scrying used to.  The unfathomable depth of the darkness he’s standing in.  None of it’s real.  It can’t be.  

What, then, is his subconscious trying to tell him?  

Adam closes his eyes—a pointless force of habit—and focuses inward.  At first he feels nothing.  Nothing, and then finally, a tug.  Something familiar.  Something important.  _Ronan?_   he thinks, though he can’t imagine why.

_Take me there_ , he instructs the dream.  And the place that isn’t a place heaves to appease him. 

The scent of pine and grass and dirt grows stronger.  Something about the energy is different, too.  It crackles and hums through the air.

The scene in front of him doesn’t make any sense.  For the most part, there’s still nothing to see.  Just a light shifting in strange patterns along the ground, sprawling in every direction from a single point nearby.  It hasn’t made a dent in the darkness.  If the dream _did_ conjure him a copy of the forest, it’s well-hidden.  

All he sees is that bizarre light, pulsing away.  It’s not black.  It’s not white.  It’s not any color, really—but all of them and none combined.  _The color of magic_.  And at its center, Ronan.

Every hair on Adam’s body stands on end.  He has no idea what he’s looking at.  Ronan’s lying prone on the textureless ground, arms spread.  Seemingly unconscious.  And that light is all around him.  Tendrils wrapped over limbs and chest and throat, pinning him in place.

Adam steps forward.  He tries, anyway.  But something blocks him, too—something he can’t get around.  It’s like an invisible wall rises between them the moment he makes to move.  Anxiety licks at his nerves. 

The more he looks, the more he’s sure the strands are leading _away_ from Ronan.  That they’re siphoning something.  Stealing from him.  Then his gaze catches on the coils around his neck, and fear roots Adam to the spot more solidly than whatever’s holding him. 

The bruise-dark circles under Ronan’s eyes.  How he kept losing time over winter break.  _Could it be?_

Is that what’s been going on this whole time?  For _months?_

How could they have missed it?  How could _he_ have missed it? 

Where did they go wrong?  Gansey had _died_ for this.  How could— 

Is that what’s happening to him?  Why he’s seeing all those things?  Does it still have a hold on him?

_Fuck_.  He can’t see Ronan’s face.  Can’t tell if there’s black running from his nose or ears or mouth.

Adam slams himself against the barricade.  Pushing, shoving, pounding with fists and feet.  Shouting all the while.

The effort gets him nowhere.  The barrier won’t budge.  He’s trapped.  He’s trapped on the wrong side of this—

Dream. 

_Wake up_ , he thinks urgently.  _Right now.  You have to—  Fuck.  Just.  Wake.  Up._

Time stops.  Adam could swear he feels two pulses beating within him.  His own hammering heart, and one much slower.  Older.  Heavy in the ache of his hands; the rawness of his throat.  _Ronan_ , he remembers then.

He lunges for the nightstand, unmindful of the sheets tangled around his legs.  His elbow comes down hard against the bedframe, and his phone clatters uselessly to the ground.  “ _Fuck_ ,” he hisses.  He’s glad Elliot’s out of town for the weekend—the commotion is deafening in the grey silence of the hour.

Adam scrambles into the floor, blankets and all.  Every one of his senses narrows to the spaces between ringing tones.  Panic isn’t a strong enough word for what he’s feeling.  Ronan’s taking too long to answer.

“ _Parrish?_ ”  He sounds like he just barely dragged himself awake.

“Are you okay?”

Ronan swears.  “Fucking shit, Adam.  Yes.  It’s…  _Jesus—_ four AM?  What the goddamn?” 

“God.  _God._ ”  His heart’s still pounding away, going a million miles a minute.  “I had this awful dream.” 

He groans, then.  “Shit, man, I’m sorry.”  Adam hears him drag a hand down his face.  “You alright?  Wanna talk about it, or…” 

“It felt so real,” he murmurs.  “If I didn’t know any better, I’d say that I was scrying.”  And Ronan goes quiet.  

“The demon was back.  You were in this pitch black forest and it was… _feeding_ off of you.  I could see it happening and I couldn’t...”  A shiver of apprehension works its way down Adam’s spine.  

“Are you okay?”  His voice sounds so weak.  “ _What’s going on_ , Ronan?” he finally gathers the will to ask.

Ronan swallows audibly.  “What are you talking about?”

Adam barks out a laugh, bitter and undignified.  “What am I _talking_ about?  _Christ_.  The way you’ve been acting.  How you haven’t been sleeping.  The way you look like something’s draining the life from you, bit by bit.” 

“Adam—” 

But he’s halfway to hysterical now.  He can’t stop.  “Was it real?  Did you know about it?  Why haven’t you told me?  Were you ever going to?  _Fuck_ , Ronan, I thought this was over!” 

“ _Adam!_   Stop.  _Stop_.  It was a dream, okay?  A dream.  I’m okay.”  He hears a ragged gasping sound and realizes, distantly, that he’s the one making it.  “Breathe, Adam.  I need you to breathe for me, okay?  Nice and slow.  In and out.  Listen to me.  In.  And out.” 

He’s embarrassed by how long it takes to get himself back under control.  But Ronan’s there to guide him through every minute of it.  “It was a dream,” he repeats when Adam has a handle on his sanity.  “I’m okay.  You don’t need to worry about that, okay?  The demon’s dead.”

“I know.  I… _thought_ I knew that.  But I kept thinking, what if we missed something?  It felt so real.” 

“I’m sorry,” murmurs Ronan.  He sounds… guilty, almost.  “That shit really sucks.”

Probably that’s supposed to make him feel better.  But Adam just feels put in his place.  At least _his_ nightmares _weren’t_ real.  How childish he felt, to complain to Ronan about them.  

But they’d always been there for each other.  Ronan never made him feel bad for talking about his fears.  Never made Adam feel like his were any less important just because they couldn’t physically rip him to shreds. 

“I hate this,” he confesses.  “I hate feeling like something’s going to happen and I’m not gonna be there to do anything about it.” 

“Stop that shit, Parrish.  You’ve got your own life to live.  It’s not your goddamn job to worry about mine.”  Adam doesn’t think that’s fair.  He loves Ronan.  Of course he’s going to worry about him.  He can’t just turn that off.  He’s not a monster. 

“That’s not on you.  I’m fine.  Don’t—”  Ronan stops, takes a deep breath, and regroups.  “Don’t even _think_ about sacrificing the things that are important to you for _me_ , okay?  That’s not gonna happen.  I’m not gonna let it.”

“You deserve the world,” he promises.  “And you’re going to get it.”

  

✧  ✧  ✧

 

Adam can feel the sanity slipping away from him.  Logic and observation were his cornerstones; they had been for years.  Yet the only thing he can make heads or tails of anymore is school.  Not what’s happening to him.  And certainly not Ronan. 

He knows he’s being ridiculous.  But the uncertainty is killing him by degrees.  He’s half-convinced he’s losing it.  Half-convinced he’s losing _him_. 

There’s just not enough to work with.  All Adam has to go off of is the bold assumption that everything he thought he knew about Ronan was true and still applied.  He knows he’s missing something.  Something big. 

They still talk.  (Sometimes, at least — never mind that it’s going on three days since he last heard from him, for seemingly no reason at all.)  He still tells Adam he loves him when they do.  And Ronan might be a lot of things, but a liar wasn’t one of them. 

He would say something, wouldn’t he?  If this were making him miserable and nothing else?  But it’s not misery he hears in his voice.  It’s exhaustion.  The rest was just…   He didn’t know.  Adam struggles not to think the worst.  Ronan told him that wasn’t it.  He has no choice but to believe him.  

_What, then?_   And what the hell had that dream been about? 

He can’t bring it up with Gansey.  There’s too much he can’t explain, and _don’t break him_ is a bed of hot coals in his memory—one he keeps tripping through.  Gansey had said a lot of stupid hurtful things over the years, but that one ached the most.  

The fact that he couldn’t just be happy for them.  Acting like Adam didn’t know the real Ronan at all; hadn’t spent hours carefully considering his decisions because of it.  Like he had hurt Ronan, _was_ hurting him, was always going to be, and had always been.  Cutting straight through to one of Adam’s biggest fears with laser precision.  It was fucked up. 

He keeps his mouth shut.  He wouldn’t even know where to begin.  Everything was such a goddamned mess. 

But Gansey notices on his own.  Adam’s not sure why he’s surprised.  His friend could be observant when he wanted, and he proves it with a _has Ronan been less forthcoming than usual?_

Adam’s heart skips a beat or two or four.  “How do you mean?” 

“Well, I know he’s always despised his phone.  But I never can seem to get through to him as of late.  He won’t pick up when I call.  And he answers text hours later, or not at all.  I can’t help but feel like I’m screaming into the void most of the time.” 

So it _isn’t_ just him.  Adam doesn’t know if that makes him feel better or worse.  “He’s been going off-grid more than usual, yes.”

“But you do still talk?”

The question sounds well-meaning enough, but it feels like a trap.  He dodges it with another _yes._  

Gansey gives a long-suffering sigh.  “I do wish one of us could be there.  It’s not that I don’t trust him, but, well.  We know all too well the trouble he got into _with_ the presence of constant discouragement.  I worry what he might consider acceptable pastimes, left to his own devices.” 

Adam is abruptly annoyed on Ronan’s behalf.  “He can make his own decisions, Gansey.  He’s an adult.  He’s the one with a house and two pseudo-dependents.  I think he’s got it covered.” 

“Of course.  I didn’t mean to imply—” 

“Yes, you did,” he mutters.  But the damage is done.  Now Adam can’t help but think… 

When does Ronan get cagey?  _When he asks him why he’s not sleeping.  When he asks what he’s been doing instead._   Was it possible he’d fallen back into old habits?  The prospect of Ronan playing fast and loose with his life again turns his stomach. 

“How are you doing?” Gansey asks perceptively.

Adam swallows his unease.  “Is there a word like homesick, but for a person?”

“Not as such, I don’t believe.”

He blows out a breath.  Deliberately sidestepping the thousands of worries knocking about inside his skull.  That would be too easy, wouldn’t it?  Of course there wasn’t a word that could encompass… _all this_.

Gansey continues, “But that’s not to say that home can’t be a person.”

 

✧  ✧  ✧

  

“I have a surprise for you.”

_Hello to you too, jackass_. 

Ronan’s refusal to engage in any kind of small talk was pretty well par for the course.  Adam’s used to that.  The burgeoning collection of missed calls and unread texts… not so much.

It’s the kind of shit he might have expected when he first left for college.  But Ronan had long since proven himself capable of using his phone where Adam was concerned.  The silence had been intentional.  

_Eleven goddamned days._   

A week and a half of disappointment and heartache and Elliot asking if they’d broken up.  Five days before he caved and called Declan just to make sure the asshole was still among the living. 

Ronan was punishing him, the bastard.  Like this hadn’t been dumped in his lap without warning.  Like he sought it out on purpose.  Like he really wanted to have to make this decision in the first place. 

He’s teetering on the mangled edge of fury. 

“For what?” he responds suspiciously.

“Do I have to have a fucking reason?”

“Oh, your tone says you do.  And if it has anything to do with July, _reconsider_.  You should know better by now.”

“Yeah no, I’m not making your stubborn ass wait that long.  When can I see you?”  Ronan glosses over the acid in his voice, a fact that would please Adam if it weren’t so busy pissing him off.  

_Whenever you want, just get your ass in the car and drive_.  It’s an uncharitable thought, and he knows it.  

Ronan’s asking when he’ll be back at the Barns.  And if he’d bothered to discuss it with Adam instead of progressively ignoring him, he’d know.  But no — it was infinitely more productive to act like a selfish, spoiled brat. 

He’d waited for Ronan to tell him not to take it. 

_Do you want me to come home this summer?_  

It was a simple question.  It was supposed to be.  Adam gave him plenty of room to cool off before he asked.  Waited until he couldn’t wait anymore.  But what did he respond? 

_Don’t be stupid.  I know you got that internship._   

And Adam’s heart collapsed like a dying star.  He was supposed to say _yes._  

“My internship starts the day after finals end.  I’ve got less than a day to move into the housing they arrange.” 

_I’m not coming home_ , he thinks.  _Are you happy now?_   

The silence stretches itself thin.

Ronan cauterizes every ounce of emotion from his voice when he responds, “You’re not coming back.”  It’s not a question.

_Just bring it with you if it matters so goddamn much_ , he wants to deflect.  But it’s too risky to pick a fight right now.  If they talk any less, they won’t be speaking at all.  Adam bites his tongue.

“I’ll be home the weekend of the Fourth.  We get Monday off.”

Ronan doesn’t speak.  Doesn’t breathe.  He’s quiet for so long, Adam glances at his phone to make sure the call hasn’t dropped.  He knows it hasn’t, though.  There’s frustration in the silence.  Hurt.  And a thousand words unsaid.

His fingers seek comfort —seek strength— at his wrist.  But the bracelet feels cold, and Adam doesn’t know whether it’s truth or pessimism making it so.  He’s afraid, suddenly, that the next words out of Ronan’s mouth are going to be _don’t bother_. 

Stomach in his throat, he digs for the part of himself that still has the wherewithal to joke.  Anything to get Ronan back, even for just a moment.  “Don’t buy me anything for my birthday.” 

Ronan scoffs, and Adam holds his breath.  The gentle warmth of his response tempers the chill lashing through his spine.  “Don’t worry, shithead.  I won’t.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope what came out the other end of my cavernous depression rut isn’t terribly disappointing!   
>  Please feel free to leave comments, theories, questions, incoherent pterodactyl screeches, etc :)

**Author's Note:**

> Yell at me on [tumblr](http://moreraventhanothers.tumblr.com)


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